Every Dope has his day
by Dakyu
Summary: Danny sighed. All he had ever wanted was a vacation...was that too much to ask? DxS edited
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: don't own Danny p, but hey, I can still write these little dorky fanfics whenever I want, neh?**

**This chapter of the fic was inspired partly from an ACTUAL babysitting experience of mine…it's not the truth down to every single part, (since I was babysitting with another guy, so of course there wasn't really any "fluff" going on between us, ha-ha) but a lot of the funnier stuff is actually the stuff that's true, and given what happened to us, I thought it was worthy of writing a chapter about **

**Parenthood**

"You know, you can't help but feel a _little_ sorry for Dash…"

Two pairs of bug eyes stared back blankly at the originator of the comment.

"Danny, you can't be serious…" Tucker started; practically flabbergasted that someone could hold pity for the muscle-bound geek-pummeller.

"Well, for failing the project he and Paullina had to do the sack of flour thing again…" The ghost boy blinked as a frustrated Dash came stomping around the corner, Paullina waving a very gaseous and noisy sack around in one hand and poms in the other.

"You have pads! All I have are these little poms and this ever so cute cheerleaders outfit. You don't expect me to stuff this up my _skirt_, do you?"

"Hey! A stinky sack of baby is no macho thing for a hunky football player like me! (He flexed as he said "hunky," and Sam gagged.) As far as I'm concerned, taking care of the baby is the GIRL'S job, no matter how pretty you are!"

The argument continued down the hall, the trio that consisted of Tucker, Sam, and Danny just stared in a combination of awe and pity.

"You know, it's moments like these that make it hard to believe we're not in some sort of cartoon," Tucker muttered.

"Kudos to the American school system…may it prosper forever more…" Sam said unenthusiastically, and began rummaging through her locker once again with low eyelids.

She quickly finished gathering her things, and the three compadres set about their separate ways. Danny shrugged. "I dunno. I probably wouldn't be caught dead taking care of a baby…"

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

"**What do you mean I have to take care of a baby**!" Danny exclaimed.

"Now, now, dear. It will only be for tonight," Maddie said as she slipped her hood off, revealing a nice set of makeup that said "I'm going out tonight" all over it.

"Besides, we have full trust in you Danny. The other babysitter that took care of this kid just started screaming and ran away and never came back, but we have the most absolute confidence that that won't happen to you…" As the ghost child's father spoke, he slipped out of his spandex suit, revealing a tuxedo underneath. And, much to his son's amusement, he could see yet ANOTHER spandex suit underneath the tux he was wearing.

Wouldn't he have been hot in that much stuff?

Danny shook his head vigorously to clear it of unneeded thoughts. He was getting desperate. "But I don't even know whose baby this IS! I—"

His mother continued on her journey out of her suit, revealing a lush velvet dress beneath. "Oh, it's just the daughter of Kristen, you remember her, right?"

"…NO!"

"That's my boy!" Jack grinned proudly.

"Dad!" Danny exasperated. "I don't even know the first THING about babies!"

"Nonsense, Danny. You did that awesome project with that bean sack—"

He grimaced at the memory. "It was a flour sack dad, it just farted…"

"Whatever! You did an awesome job of handling that stinky bag of love that we all trust you enough with the safety of this young child."

Bags suddenly appeared beneath Danny's eyes.

Maddie turned about, handing Danny a list of emergency phone numbers. "We'll only be gone until around midnight, you should be able to handle the cute little bundle of joy until then."

The bags somehow grew deeper.

The "baby exchange" took place so fast that Danny didn't even really see Kristen, and before he knew it there was bald, blue-eyed baby sitting in his arms, a bag of baby trinkets complete with a crib sitting in his living room, and he was staring at a fading dust cloud on the road in the distance.

A flash of his previous "baby" and its adventures loomed in his mind. The sack getting stolen by Skulker, fighting over it with Valerie, while getting chained to her and the desperate goose chase of trying to find it while fighting off ghosts and…

Nothing good was going to come of this, was it?

He hung his head miserably. "I'm doomed…"

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

"**What do you mean you have a baby to take care of**!"

"I don't know what happened! But it's not like I know anything about taking care of one!"

"Oh, and _I_ do?"

"Well, you WERE the only one who got an 'A' for taking care of a sack…"

"Oh, that makes me REAL inclined to go over there and help, Danny."

"Sam!" he begged desperately to the screen with a glaring girl on it, "Please, I need your help! I don't know the first _thing_ about babies!"

"So of course you called me first, since I'm a girl, right?"

"Would you rather I call Tuck over?" A sadistically amused smile bloomed on his face. "I'm sure that'd spell a nice little nuclear disaster…"

He heard a "psh" from the other end of the line. "He's at a family outing, wouldn't happen anyways…" She blinked, pondering his previous words. "And why nuclear? Wouldn't it be more--?"

"Damn!" Danny cut her off, turning away from the phone for a minute, his face looking to one of horror as the baby did something on the sidelines that Sam couldn't decipher. "Please Sam! Can you come over! I'm dying here!"

"Alright, alright, alright! Sheesh, I was already on my way."

Danny's face brightened as if God himself had just graced him with something. "Really! Sam, I can't thank you—"

"Seeya soon."

Click.

He stared blankly at the phone for a minute. "A rude savior…" he pondered.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

When Sam rang to doorbell to Danny's house, everything seemed normal…at first…

As soon as the door opened, there was no complete chaos in the room like she had expected. Just a chaotic Danny. Hair disheveled in all directions, shirt rumpled and covered in…something….moist…and a bouncing baby with the bigger, shinier eyes than should have been possible on a living being.

The baby gurgled, a small spit bubble sitting innocently on his lip.

Danny looked to her with pleading eyes. "Help?"

She almost outright laughed, but before she could her eyes bugged out again and she quickly put a hand over her nose.

She sighed as best she could without her nose, and tried as best she could to keep the toxic fumes from going down her throat. "Let's get started…" she said nasally.

The door slammed shut…hard….and Sam took a look at the damage so far.

At that point, there wasn't all that much that was going wrong. The crib was upside down, there was an incredible lingering stench in the air…but besides that, and Danny of course, there wasn't much else going wrong.

Still holding onto her nose, she pointed up the stairs. "Ok, give me the baby, and you go change. Oof…I'm gonna suffocate…"

"Alright. I'm just glad this stuff didn't come out the other end…"

She flinched slightly in surprise, then her expression darkened slightly with a minor loss of patience. She sighed, taking the baby from him. "Just go up and change."

Danny's shoulders rose in a shrugged defeat, and he started up the stairs, a few mild grumbles escaping his lips.

Sam blinked.

"Why is there a vomit stain on your wall?"

"Intangibility comes in handy!" he called from the top of the stairs.

Her face turned sour.

She lowered the baby into the crib, and it seemed content to just sit there for a bit. From what she could see, it couldn't crawl yet, which would greatly simplify things…last thing that they needed was to have it go crawling off into the ghost zone.

Her fingers rubbing her temples for a moment, there was another gurgle from the baby.

Danny phased down through the floor, now in a new set of clothing. Much to her amusement, he had a clothespin on his nose, and as he settled on the floor reverting to his human form, he held one out to her. In a nasal voice, he asked "Want one?"

"Sure. Man, and I thought I'd smelled some bad stuff…"

"Heh, pretty bad, isn't it?"

"Oh yeah…"

Silence fell for a moment, and another cheerful squeal rang through the air.

"He sure seems happy…" Danny mused.

"Have you changed its diaper yet?" Sam waved her hand ineffectively at the smell in front of her nose. "The air's burning out my lungs…"

Danny's face when into a state of blank surprise, before he said an apologetic "No."

Sam sighed. "Well, I think _that_ should be our place to start…"

The baby was laid out on a table, his little legs kicking cutely into the air, another little bubble of drool popping over his tiny little mouth. He almost could have been considered cute…

If he hadn't been QUITE so rancid…

Danny poked the outside of the diaper, a small squeak of leaking air squirting out the side. After a deep breath, he looked up at Sam. "I'm thinking that we're gonna need some equipment for this…"

Her eyes lowered to the baby, eyebrows flat, then raised back up to his face. "Like what?"

"I was thinking something like the ecto-skeleton…"

"Oh please. It's a baby, Danny, you don't need a powerful machine like that to deal with changing a baby's DIAPER…"

"You do realize that by saying that you probably just jinxed me into doing something stupid, right?"

"You'll probably do something stupid, anyway," she said wryly.

At this the ghost boy glared, but then realized it was true and could only shrug. "Eh, good point."

He turned back to the baby, and began to take in a deep breath, before he thought better of it and decided to just start taking the diaper off.

"Um…"

"'Um' what?"

"How do you take the diaper off?"

"Straps on the side, Danny…"

A nervous laugh escaped his lips. "Heheh. Oh, right."

Slowly, cautiously, his fingers pulled at the sticky straps on the side, and revealed…

"EW!"

Danny turned to the side, gagging, Sam following suit.

"Holy crap! That shouldn't be legal!"

After Sam finished coughing, she turned towards him with a quirked eyebrow. "Legal?"

He coughed again. "Yeah, it should be illegal for parents to have to deal with that…"

Immediately, Sam felt an intense blush come to her cheeks at what that statement implied, but it faded as quickly as it had come, and Danny apparently hadn't noticed his own suggestion at them being "parents."

Danny stood up oh shaky legs, his breathing rather raspy because of his lack of interest of breathing in the "toxic fumes" that had permeated through most of the stuff in the room.

He pulled the diaper off, holding it with one hand at arms length, his face a look of complete and utter distaste. "Yep…should definitely be illegal…."

"What are you looking at _me_ for?" Sam asked.

"Um…where should I put it?"

"Well, a garbage can would be nice…"

"I would, but wouldn't that sorta stink up the house a lot?"

Sam's face morphed into a pondering look. "Yeah, you're right…"

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

"I don't really think that the other ghosts are going to appreciate that…" Sam muttered as the door of the portal to the ghost zone closed.

Danny shrugged. "That thing was radioactive anyway."

He took Sam's hand in his own as he went intangible, and soon both of their heads broke through the floor of the living room bringing them, inevitably, back to the baby.

Danny sighed, taking his clothespin of his nose. "It _should_ be safe to breathe for a bit…" but his nose immediately wrinkled. "Note the _'should'_…"

Sam shook her head. She could have sworn she was in some sort of whacky cartoon whenever she was around Danny.

"So…now what?"

Sam laughed slightly. "We put another diaper on, of course."

"Well yeah, but HOW? I mean, I've heard about baby powder and stuff…how does all that work?"

She blinked. "You can't be serious…"

"Well…I'm the youngest in my family…"

She crossed her arms. "And I'm an only child."

"Blecch." He turned towards the baby, and reached for the clear tub containing the white powder that Kristen had so generously left in the baby bag.

"Well, here goes…"

He shook the end experimentally, and nothing came out. He shook again, harder this time, and the entire cap fell off, spilling a nice little avalanche of white powder onto the baby.

He sighed. "Oh great, yet another mess to clean—"

_PFFFFTTTT!_

The mess was gone…or rather, the mess had moved to Danny's face…

At that moment in time, Sam was torn between the urges to grimace and to laugh…

His eyes showed through the makeshift snowman outfit that he now adorned on his face, and his left eye twitched.

Leave it to a baby to come up with a new way to make a mess by farting, Danny thought bitterly.

The powder fell through his face as he went intangible once again, making a little "foof" as it hit the floor with a small cloud of dust.

He gagged, spitting to the side a little. "Leave it to a baby to find a new way to embarrass me…" he spat.

Sam giggled at this, then paused a moment, realizing how incredibly ditzy she had just seemed. Once again, thankfully, Danny the oblivious and/or clueless hadn't noticed.

For this once at least, his denseness had actually come in handy, she mused.

Hurriedly the ghost child slipped another diaper over the baby's legs before another "blaspheming wave" could overtake their senses and banish them into oblivion.

Danny took off the nose clip, experimentally sniffing the air.

"Well, at least the air is breathable now…" he muttered. He leaned over the baby, the little bundle of joy cooing softly. He picked him up experimentally, weighing the baby in his arms. "No thanks to this little bundle of rancid bodily functions…"

Sam laughed a light laugh at this, and came over to where the two of them were standing.

"Hm. He's cute," she thought aloud, "you have to give him that…"

The baby looked up at Danny at that moment, eyes shinier than diamonds and cute little mouth quivering that DARED anyone to _not_ call him cute.

"Yeah. I guess he's not so bad once—"

The baby hiccupped briefly…then…

"BLEAH!"

_Splut!_

Danny's lower eyelid quivered slightly in indignation. Sam made a quick face of disgust. "Um…you need to go change again?"

"Y-yeah…"

After handing off the baby, he began stalking up the stairs, muttering about his intangibility not being fast enough to deal with babies.

Sam set the baby in his crib, and it was only milliseconds before he was deep in slumber, a little snot bubble expanding and contracting with every breath.

Well, nothing was perfect…

A moment passed, and Danny, once again in another clean shirt, floated down through the floorboards, a comical expression of distaste on his face.

"Well, I see that our little ultimate weapon is asleep…"

"For the moment, at least." Sam said with a sigh.

"Don't say that, you'll jinx the peace we have right now…"

"Quit being a worry wart." She took a look at the damage. "Alright, it's not too bad in here…"

"With what?"

"The cleaning. We need to clean up the baby's mess, you know."

The bags under Danny's eyes deepened once again. "Somehow I just knew it was gonna come to this…"

The entire job would have taken very little time in itself, but scrubbing down the walls while trying to stay quiet was another story entirely, and, contrary to popular belief, took a great deal of energy to do.

Gathering up the dust from the baby's flatulence was another problem…a vacuum cleaner was out of the question with him sleeping, so the two of them had to make due with a broom and dustpan that they had happened to find in the closet.

"Wow. I'm surprised that there weren't any anti-ghost devices on this thing," Sam muttered in whispered amazement as she dumped another load of dust into a garbage bag.

"Are you out to jinx us?" Danny hissed.

"What, do you think that it's gonna just—"

GHOST ALERT! GHOST ALERT!

Danny's head creaked like an old door on a rusty hinge as he turned towards Sam, who shrugged with innocence.

He quickly turned ghost and threw the broom out the window, which flashed away into the netherworld with a tiny green mushroom cloud in the distance.

Danny phased down into the room, turning human and flopping down on the couch in an exhausted heap.

"You'd think…" he panted, "…that taking care of a puny little baby…wouldn't be so much work…"

Sam laughed at that statement, and sat down on the corner of the couch.

"Like your first day of being a 'dad'?" she smirked.

"Probably about as much as you enjoyed being a mom," he groaned.

Once again, she felt her face turn beet red. Why was this idea of them having a kid making her blush to no end? Sure, if someone had suggested that she have kids with someone in particular, she'd be in an awkward situation…

But this…?

"Sam?"

She suddenly snapped out of it. "What? Oh, yeah, this was a pretty tiring day…" she covered quickly. To emphasize, she flopped down on the couch as well.

Danny couldn't believe that she had done that…she had just flopped down on top of him…

But it wasn't really _that_, that had surprised him. It was her face after he had suggested that she was the "mom" while he was the "dad."

It suggested that she was almost…reluctant…to leave it.

Sam's eyes snapped open, realizing the intensely close proximity that she had put herself in. An embarrassed smile came over her face. "Uh…hi…"

"Hi…" Danny smiled and half laughed a bit.

Sam looked around for anything that she could use…for what, she didn't even really know at that moment, but she was currently sitting on the couch, with Danny, alone, in an awkward situation, and something had to be done about it…

Suddenly…

_Wump!_

"Hey!"

"Pillow fight!" Sam announced, and immediately another pillow came down upon his head, another surprised yelp escaping his lips.

"Oh, it's _on_ now!" he mock challenged, readying up his "weapon."

There were more squeals and yelps and other such immature noises, the baby oblivious to it all in the other room, thankfully.

Outside, a pair of golden reptilian eyes glanced down at a photograph, then up through the window at the joyful pair.

"_This_…is the savior….?" Once again, the eyes glanced in a look of both shock and disbelief from the picture to the figures playfully dueling inside.

The eyes rolled, and the figure turned away with an exasperated look riveting his features.

"This is going to be harder than I thought…"

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

**Woo! First chapter done of a hopefully fun and exciting story, I hope that you all enjoyed it!**

**Well, you know the drill: reviews make my world go round! Review, and this story will continue!**

**Peace out**

**Dak**


	2. Chapter 2

**Hey all! I was actually able to update much faster than I had anticipated… (blinks) startlingly so…**

**Eh. Anyways, on with the chapter!**

**A "New" Kind of Foe…**

"Get back here Dash! My pom-poms are starting to smell like beans!"

"Taking care of babies is for girls!" Dash screamed as he ran down the hall, an infuriated Paullina hot on his heals.

In their wake a strong wind whipped everyone's hair about in a gust, though no one really seemed to notice. The few that saw the little entourage screaming past at light speed just shrugged and went back to their own business.

"That was freaky…" Tucker muttered.

Danny sighed. "I really think that we all need to move somewhere a little more normal…"

"'Normal'?" Tucker cracked a smile. "Danny, the weird and strange follow you wherever you GO, man…"

His eyebrows lowered, and Tucker cringed slightly at the glare coming from the eyes beneath. "Thanks, Tuck. You sure know how to cheer someone up…"

Sam laughed a little as well. "Oh come on, it's not like it's about to get weirder any time soon, right?"

His glare softened lightly, but it was now turned towards her.

"What?"

"You realize that you probably just jinxed me again, don't you?"

"Oh come on, you don't honestly believe in that stuff, do you?"

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

"You owe me money for that."

"How was I supposed to know that we'd be getting some new students today?" Sam defended. "We don't even know if they're weird!"

"We're talking about MY luck here, Sam," Danny retorted, before adding wryly "Knowing that they're probably some weird kooks that wanna make friends with me."

"And we're NOT weird?"

"Shut up, Tucker!" both of them hissed.

Said boy raised his hands in defeat, and began scrolling through his PDA files to clean up the garbage on his hard drive.

"I just don't want another Spectra thing to happen, ok?"

"Quit being so pessimistic!"

"Class," Mr. Lancer began, his words silencing the bickering students, "I'd like you to meet two new students today. Drake Arthan and his sister…" he leaned towards the short blonde girl standing next to him. "How do you pronounce your name again?" he whispered.

Sam noticed her resist the urge to roll her eyes, but she complied at answered "Karimia Arthan."

"Yes, well, please take your seats at the back of the classroom, and then we'll get started."

As they passed, Danny looked them over. Drake was a relatively tall teenager, though not nearly as big as Dash; Danny guessed him to be around 5'11" or so in height, a fairly muscular build, and dark, shoulder-length hair pulled back in a low ponytail. His face was strongly built, with a slightly prominent chin and medium cheekbones. His clothes were bland: a dark unmarked navy t-shirt with slightly baggy jeans. But perhaps the strangest thing about this guy that Danny noticed was his eyes.

They were so hazel, they were almost gold.

As he passed, Danny could have sworn he saw those eyes glint slightly, like a cat's eyes in light…

Karimia passed, smiling her hello both with her mouth and her snowy blue eyes at the three of them. Not quite as intimidating as her counterpart, her waist-length hair was also pulled back in a tight ponytail that fell in a mop about her backpack hanging from her shoulders. Her clothing wasn't particularly flattering; no where near as revealing as Paullina's "I'm always going to expose my stomach and flounce around my beauty so there" or any of the other popular girls' attire. It was much more simple, a black t-shirt that said "by reading this you have given my brief control of your mind" and black jeans.

She actually reminded him a lot of Sam, strangely.

Tucker smiled at her, and she smiled a hello to him before following her brother to the back of the class room into two adjacent seats.

Lancer began the lesson, but Danny's concentration was completely messed up. He couldn't concentrate, not when those golden eyes were burning into his back.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

Lunch came around at its usual time, and due to the spring weather, the students had been allowed to go outside into the warm sunshine.

This period found Sam, Tucker, and Danny beneath one of the large oak trees in the field, tongues of shadow from the leaves above spread about them in some sort of perfect, yet undeterminable, pattern.

Sam had long since finished her tofu sandwich, though Danny hadn't even touched his food. He sat on a prominent root of the tree, deep in thought. So deep in thought, that he didn't notice Tucker's hand snake right under his gaze and snatch his lunch out of its bag.

"What's bothering _you_?" Sam inquired, leaning down on the grass so that her chin was propped up by one arm.

"The new guys. What else?"

"They do seem (gulp) pretty nice (bite chew chew) though," Tucker commented between, and during, mouthfuls of Danny's lunch.

The ghost boy grimaced slightly, but said nothing of his friend's eating habits.

"I just don't get it…it's like they're hiding something…"

"Not everyone is hiding ghostly qualities, Danny," Sam snorted. "Maybe they just have something in their past that they don't want anyone else to know."

"Maybe. But I still can't shake off the feeling that they're ghosts or something…"

Tucker glanced around a bit to make sure no one else was within earshot. "Well, (munch munch) they could be halfas like you, Danny."

Danny's eyes widened at that, his chin falling to rest on his palm in concentrated thought. "Do you really think so?" he asked, pondering slightly.

"I wouldn't dismiss that idea, Danny. I mean, Vlad has powers too, you might not be as unique as you think…"

"Did your (gulp) ghost sense go off in class?"

"No, and that's the strange part. (Tucker, stop eating my lunch…) Do you think that they're concealing it somehow?"

"Yeah, remember the princess thing? That one woman was using a ring and Danny couldn't sense her," Tucker pointed out.

"He was also drowning in estrogen and hormones…" Sam spat bitterly.

Her love interest could only shrug helplessly at that comment. "I'm sorry! I'm just a teenage guy with hormones, I can't change that!"

"Eh," Tucker shrugged. "It was fun while it lasted…" he added dreamily, eyes unfocused and gazing into la-la land.

A nerve throbbed on Sam's head, and she made a glare that would have made Vlad Masters wet his pants.

Tucker's face went into a blank state of shock, before he whimpered and ran behind the tree, peeking out around the edge in fear.

Sam shook her head slightly in an exasperated shame, and turned back to Danny.

"Well, what do you think we should do?"

"I think that we should…" as soon as the idea came to him, it sounded stupid, and he dropped it.

"Should what?"

"I was gonna say go over there and ask what their business is, but that sounds even stupider when I say it…" He groaned.

"Yeah, it kinda does, dude," Tucker snickered. "But then again I don't have anything better to offer," he added quickly in response to Danny's glare.

"Main thing is that we don't rush into anything here. The last thing we need is…"

"GET BACK HERE DASH BAXTON!"

"I DON'T WANNA SMELL LIKE BEANS!"

"…They're **STILL** running?" Danny wondered half to himself.

"It's almost like a broken record, only more annoying," Tucker observed.

"…Anyways…" Sam attempted to restart conversation through half-lidded eyes with her fish-eyed counterparts.

"They're made for each other," Tucker smirked finally.

Sam turned back to her friends as the strange pair disappeared into the distance. "As I was saying, the last thing we need to do is provoke them and cause some unwanted attention…"

"Why? If they ARE ghosts, then Danny can just kick their butts," Tucker pointed out.

"And what if they're _not_?" Sam pushed.

"Not ghosts?" both of the boys said at the same time.

"Well," Danny said as his scratched his chin, "I never really thought about it before, but I guess they COULD be…"

"That would explain why your ghost sense didn't go off," Tucker noted.

Danny nodded. "But that leaves the question…what exactly ARE they?"

"BRRRAAAAPPPP!"

"EW!"

_GONK!_

_THUD!_

The trio of friends looked over towards a nearby picnic bench to see Karimia fuming slightly, Drake sprawled out flat on the ground with a small cloud of dust settling around.

"Can't you just be civilized for ONCE!" she shouted.

He looked up at her for a moment, confused, then immediately switched his facial expression to one that was much angrier.

"What? I can't express myself?" he countered.

Somehow, Sam thought, it sounded fake…

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

Karimia groaned in pain as the door to their apartment opened with a loud creak. Tempted to throw her backpack to the ground with a loud thud, she thought better of it because of the faulty condition that the floorboards seemed to be in.

"What a waste of a day," Drake muttered, his backpack dropping to the floor next to a ratty couch.

"Have a good day, I take it?"

From the kitchen, an older oriental woman, appearing to be in her early thirties, came over from her "post" in the other room.

"Of course, 'mom,'" Karimia said humorously.

"Keep up that mom line and I'm cutting off your allowance," she said sarcastically, and immediately pulled out a small handheld computer.

"You know, Sarah, you should really put that down sometime soon, you know that right?"

"Yeah, I know Drake," the woman snorted. "But, as your leader, I have to work things out. It's not easy to get fake IDs that go all the way back through your history."

"I don't really think we're gonna need something that goes back that far…"

"Kari, you're entering into a school system. If one thing looks odd, our cover is as good as blown. And plus we don't even know how long were gonna be staying here."

"We know who this 'savior' is," Drake grunted as he pulled off his shoes and socks, each coming off with an audible pop. "Isn't that enough?"

Sarah gave a look that said "you are the stupidest man on the face of this planet."

Both hands risen in defeat, he turned towards the fridge, snorting in disgust and annoyance when he found nothing but cobwebs in it. "Alright, what am I missing?" he called back over his shoulder.

"The unpredictable elements here. We really need to take things slow. The first thing's first, we need to start carrying out a plan."

Karimia looked thoughtful for a moment, though it was Drake who smiled first.

"I have the perfect idea."

"This isn't gonna resemble what happened at lunch with the belched fireball, is it?"

"What?" Drake started defensively. "That was Karimia! She just blamed it on _me_!"

The blonde haired girl blushed. "Well, it did _sound_ like you did it…"

His eye twitched. "Fat difference THAT makes…" After all, he couldn't even USE fire…

Why did he always get blamed for everything?

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

_Ring ring!_

Snore.

_Ring ring!_

"Buh…wha…?"

There was a pause, and the bright blue eyes were about to close again in sleep, before the telephone blared a gigantic siren that Jack had installed.

Danny screamed and leapt out of bed, then phased through it, falling into the bed. His head poked up, disheveled, eyes set low into his skull; he grumbled as he hopped up out of the bed, then crawled over to the phone.

"Yeah Tucker?"

"How did you know it was me?"

"You're the only one who's ever been able to get the Fenton phone alarm to go off before…"

"On orthodox, but it works…"

Danny flopped on the bed tiredly. "Why are you calling me right now? It's Saturday morning…" he whined.

"Well, it's sorta about Sam…"

"Yes…?"

"I don't know whether I should sorta tell you or if I should—"

"Tucker, quit the ominous thing, and just get to the point!"

"Ok! Ok! Sam was sorta kidnapped…"

Danny was immediately awake.

"WHAT!"

0o0o0o0o0o0

**End chappie! Woo, I feel evil right now, heheh. Sorry for the poor quality of this chapter hangs head**

**Bleh, anyways, thanks all of the reviews so far, they really help keep me going!**

'**Til the next update!**

**Dak**


	3. Chapter 3

**Hey, I actually have free time! **

**I apologize to all fans of "clash of times" that have been waiting patiently for another chapter…but I've gotten writer's block on that one, and it will be updated when I can!**

**Anyways, here's your update :P**

**New Allies**

Danny was flying faster than he ever had in his life, the air resistance that would have normally come from such a fast travel inapplicable to his situation, as his intangibility, (though inept at dealing with babies he mused bitterly,) could make wind resistance nonexistent to him.

Basically, he was traveling incredibly fast.

The streets so far below, he probably could have touched the clouds if he had so chosen to, wisp them into little intricate shapes, like that one time he had made a heart with a D and an S in it…

"Bah!" he shook his head, the mental image of the fluffy heart vanishing into the wind. The heart would never happen if Sam remained kidnapped, and frankly, he was the only one that he trusted to rescue her…

Plus it was more chivalrous that way.

Wait…why was he thinking of chivalry at a time like this?

He shook his head to clear it once more, taking full advantage of his half-dead state to exploit a speed that no living thing, without the blessings of technology, could ever hope to attain.

At least, that's what he believed at THAT moment in time.

"Tucker, do you have any idea where Sam might have been taken?"

The nerd's image shrugged on the PDA that he had lent his best friend. "No clue. I just got a panicked phone call this morning from her parents saying that (he paused for a moment, putting both hands together next to his face, puckering his lips and bugging his eyes out in a baby like fashion) 'oh my goodness, our little Sammykins isn't here! Do you have an inclination as to where she might be?'"

"Tucker, you do that babying voice so well that it's seriously starting to scare me…"

His friend's image merely shrugged. "Everyone has their talents..." A slight smile pulled at the teen's lips. "Not everyone can shoot plasma blasts from their ass, ha-ha!"

Danny growled at the comment as he continued to fly. "Now's not the time for that, Tuck. Do you have ANY leads on where I could look for her? For as much as I LOVE flying so fast…I don't really have a direction in which I'm going…"

"You took off without knowing where she was?"

Danny blinked, and then flushed with embarrassment.

Tucker smirked, but turned serious within a nanosecond. "The way I see it, there are a few choices…"

The ghost child slowed his progress through the air down to the point where he was hardly moving. Heaving a big sigh, he glanced back down at the PDA. "Ok, what?"

"Well, since this is probably some diabolical plot to get back at you…"

"How do you figure that?"

One of Tucker's eyebrows quirked. "Why else would they capture a girl close to a superhero?"

"Huh?"

"Oh come ON, Danny, think about it. In all of the superhero comics and stuff, the girl always gets nabbed to lure the hero into some diabolical trap or something."

An awkward silence fell between them.

Tucker's face went blank for a moment. After a pause, he merely shrugged, his focus turning away from the camera for a second, obviously typing on the computer. "Well, ok, let's think. Who would be the most likely to do something like that?"

"Tucker, we don't have TIME to think! Sam's in trouble, and—"

"—we won't be able to help her unless we know where she IS, Danny." Tucker sighed. "You sometimes gotta think before you act, dude."

Danny took in a deep breath, and exhaled it slowly. "Yeah, I guess you're right…"

"Alright, so let's try to think. Who would be the most likely to do something like that?"

The ghost child's response was immediate. "Plasmius is the first that comes to mind," Danny half said, half thought aloud bitterly.

"Already researching it." His fingers flew over the keyboard. "Doesn't seem like his portal's been in use lately. Plus after you trashed his lab, (**A/N: reference to "kindred spirits")** I doubt he'd be in any position to retaliate…"

"He could just want to have revenge," he snorted. "He's no idiot, but he's _still_ a whacked-up fruit-loop…"

"True. I'll keep him on the list."

"Ember? No…box ghost?" Danny's face went blank for a second.

"Unless he planned on stuffing her into a cardboard box for the rest of eternity…"

"Not funny, Tuck."

"No one ever appreciates my humor…" he said dryly.

_Maybe because you're not funny…?_ The black-haired boy decided to keep that particular comment to himself. He was gonna need Tucker for this. He kept on naming off ghosts on his fingers; the first few eliminated consisted of Spectra, the Ghost King, (didn't know anything about his life, plus this was far too small scale for him, anyways,) the box ghost, Ember, fright night, and, of course, the lunch lady as well.

"Skulker, maybe?" Tucker suggested.

"Doesn't really sound like him. But if it WAS a ghost that took them, I'm guessing either him or Vlad. Most of the other ghosts just don't work like that."

"Yeah. Though he DID steal the baby bag from you and Valerie to lure you both into the ghost zone…"

Danny said nothing, his brows furrowed in thought. Tucker turned away to begin typing on the computer again.

It was a strange question, but it came out of Danny's mouth before he could think twice about it. "Why do you keep on typing on the computer like that? Are you documenting what we say?"

Tucker said nothing. But instead, an incredibly intense blush came to his face. "It's…well…err…um…"

Danny blinked, then eyed the PDA suspiciously. "Did I bring up something I shouldn't know about?"

"Um…w-well, you see…uh…" Tucker scratched the back of his neck, embarrassed, before he risked a glance back at the camera. Seeing Danny's unbelieving face, his arm fell to his lap, eyes quickly falling as well. "Oh crap…"

"Tucker?"

"I'm talking online…" he whispered timidly.

"WHAT!" Danny exploded. "Sam could be in life-threatening danger, and you're flirting with a girl online!"

For a brief millisecond, Danny was sure that Tucker was going to deny that it was a girl, but he just blushed harder. "Hey, I can multitask! Oh, hey, just got a sighting of her near the school."

"And how do you know that?"

"It's on the news, actually. 'Girl now held captive in what appears to be some sort of _super robbery_ at Casper High school,'" Tucker said casually in a reporter-like voice. At Danny's exasperated look, he shrugged. "It just came on, I swear!"

"Fine. I'm going to go get her."

"Anything I can help with?"

"I don't think so, not right now. I can call you if I do."

"Ok! Have fun!"

Danny's eyelids fell slightly to reveal eyes that gave the "I'm not amused" look.

Tucker shrugged for the umpteenth time, and he broke the connection. Danny could handle one ghost, as he had said in the past.

Besides, he had important stuff to talk about…

"So," he typed. "What color underwear do you have on?"

_End connection._

"Aw, man…" he quickly whipped out his own PDA. "Note to self, learn better pick-up lines…"

That was, if that could even be CALLED a pick-up line…

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

Well _this_ was a mess…

It didn't take Danny long to find why the news was…well, HAD gathered at the school. And it was no wonder that they had fled the scene. There was destruction EVERYWHERE. It looked like a wall had imploded on the side judging from the sheer amount of debris scattered carelessly about the grounds.

A few lone police cars were also strewn about randomly as well, though it seemed like they were currently vacant. Especially the one stuck inside the tree.

Danny turned his attention away from the police and the news people (or lack thereof…) glancing at the damage. It was obvious that this was no ordinary foe that had done this amount of damage. Huge craters dotted the landscape like gigantic bowls, filled with the "soup" of fallen debris.

This was gonna cost a lot for the school…not to mention the tax increase…

At least it wasn't his fault…right?

He swallowed hard as he flew into the scene invisible. Sam was here somewhere; that much he had been told, and he doubted Tucker would have lied about something this serious. Why she had been at the school was anyone's guess, but chances were that she had been taken as some sort of revenge against himself.

If she got hurt because of him…

He tried not to think about it, his hands already threatening to launch smoldering ghost rays in his frustration. The last thing he needed to go was add more pointless destruction and chaos to the situation.

There had obviously been a fight here: that much was obvious. But what had done this? Two ghosts fighting each other? Had two more ghost boys suddenly appeared and gotten feelings for Sam and started fighting over her?

His face went blank for a second. Where the hell had THAT thought come from? Why would a guy fight over a pretty, smart, funny, cool, individual, un-brainwashed, insanely hot…

Danny blinked.

Oh.

Shaking his head vigorously, he rounded a corner, looking at more of the damage. It was strange, though. All of the damage that had been done seemed like it had been overdone. Most ghost battles, though sometimes destructive…ok, most often times destructive, they didn't leave as much damage as this, excluding his battle with his future self: which had leveled a good portion of the city with their ghostly wails. It seemed like they had stayed solid this entire fight; an odd observation, considering ghosts often went intangible for fights as a defensive measure. The dents in the ground looked like gigantic foot indents left from a missed kick or something. Considering the depth, that must have HURT.

He leaned nearer to examine the closest dent in the grass. It seemed like a darned powerful one, if nothing else. But it was strange in some ways. The distribution of weight seemed all off: instead of a huge clunking foot like one would expect from Skulker or some other bulky ghost capable of this kind of damage, they were small and dainty. Like it had been PIERCED by something.

A small tiny puncture on one side and a slightly larger puncture in front of it. A strange footprint indeed…maybe a—

Any further thoughts that he had on the matter immediately erased themselves from his mind as an ear-piercing roar echoed through the schoolyard, originating from inside the school itself.

He took a step back as an unsettling rumble vibrated through the ground. It stopped for a moment, and Danny stood silent for a moment, a whirl of explanations for what was going on in his mind.

The truth of what was going on barely came before the ground erupted upwards from beneath by a gigantic rectangular reptilian head, easily 6 feet long.

In the initial blur of movement, Danny couldn't make out the details, but a long serpent-like body attached to the indisputably dragon head

If he had actually WANTED to pay attention to the dragon's facial features, in was obviously an oriental "breed," a long pair of feelers coming out of its snout in a long flowing arc over the grey striped skin. Stunted horns stuck out of the back of its head at a low angle, as strange saber-teeth, much like a saber toothed tiger's, poked out of the front two corners of its mouth.

However, there were only two things that Danny noticed. The first, being its horrifically familiar golden hazel eyes. The second being one that would wretch the ghost child's stomach unlike anything else, for as the dragon turned towards him, there was a hand dangling out of its mouth.

A limp hand with a gothic band wrapped around the wrist.

0o0o0o0o0o

**Will update soon! I promise!**


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4: Awkward circumstance**

The dragon looked blank for a moment, as if surprised. It looked at Danny in a confused fashion, then its gaze traveled down its snout down to where the arm was sticking out of its mouth. It appeared to blush for a moment, before its eyes lowered in an annoyed, exasperated look, knowing what was going to come.

But none of this would begin penetrate the impermeable membrane of his sheer rage and emotion. "Sam…"

He could feel his blood running cold, his throat going dry. A deathly cold sweat began forming on his brow, as his pupils disappeared in the horrific green glow that now emanated from his eyes, the green fires within portraying the wall of pain and guilt and anger that had permeated to his core. His hair started to whip upwards slightly in a wind, his hands burning with unreleased emotion.

"NOOOOOO!" His voice was cracked, the simple shout running like fire up his throat, the frozen flames of the call burning out his chest and scarring his tongue.

The dragon's expression remained the same. _Drama queen._

He felt dead…well, MORE dead…Sam, the girl who had helped him get these powers, the girl who had given him hope for the future and given him faith in himself, who had depended on him, was now gone. There would no longer be any sarcastic comments about how his infatuations with Valerie and Paullina were childish, no more sadistically funny rampages of how pink should die or the environmental activism speeches about caring for the frogs destined to die and be dissected for educational purposes...

He felt empty…yes, as cliché as it sounded, he was an empty shell; that was it. An unshed tear found its way down his cheek, his closed eyes unable to contain it any longer. A slight flicker appeared in his darkness…His human heart was now latent, he could feel that now.

The normal soft white aura that surrounded his entity had metamorphosized into horrific green flames, licking upwards in a strange deathly caress. Rising, the wind around his form increased dramatically. There was nothing holding him back now. There was no fear of hurting another being; there was no fear of causing more damage and destroying another life as he had accidentally done. There was no fear of death in him, no fear of Plasmius, no fear of Skulker, no fear of any ghost in existence. His fists now open to reveal a gigantic ball of a ghost ray beam in his palms, there was only one thing on his mind.

How he had failed to protect her.

With a roar of unmatchable pain, he launched the blast at his scaly foe, the dragon just barely ducking beneath the deathly orb. The attack sailed over its head and smashed into the street behind the dragon, obliterating the asphalt in a titanic explosion that shook the ground.

The dragon hardly had time to recover before Danny Phantom charged in again, his fist burying itself in the dragon's scaly, though surprisingly soft, side. It let out a muffled roar, then spun sideways, a lame attempt at diverting their flight path into the side of the school building. The boy didn't even bother going intangible, he just smashed right through it in an explosion of dust and chunks of wall.

The dragon groaned slightly as it rose out of some of the rubble, and turned to the side. With an inhalation through its nose that sounded like a person about to spit, a giant water ball fell out of its mouth, dropping to the ground with a bounce.

It bounced a few more times until it came to a stop on the grass. As the water tension broke with a loud splat, Sam appeared within it. She sat and coughed for a moment, completely soaked.

Danny erupted out of the school once more, his unseeing eyes focused only on his foe.

"Danny?" she whispered, still sputtering.

In response, another ghost ray shot out of his hand, smashing into the dragon's head and causing it to teeter backwards.

"Sam?" He stopped suddenly, eyes scanning the ground for her. Indescribable relief flooded his chest, and a single tear rolled down his cheek.

The dragon's eyes sparkled.

The ghost's expression darkened. Utter loathing, his own sheer emotion, the power of a ghost, along with the confused entrails of love boiled through his undead veins. "You betrayed us!" Danny boomed, streaking through the air once more. "DRAKE!"

The wingless serpentine dragon righted itself on the ground, the annoyed look still firmly plastered on his face, even more so portrayed by his golden eyes flicked with irritation. "So, you figured it out, eh?"

He stopped short in front of the dragon's face. "Drake the dragon, REAL original," the ghost child sadistically smirked, getting into a crouching position.

"Had the name before the powers…" he muttered.

"Why did you do this? **Why the hell did you try to kill Sam**?"

The dragon paused, a sweatdrop forming on the back of his head. "That's a fine way to say 'thank you'."

Still in his fits of rage, he charged once again. Drake rolled his eyes, and in a huge poof of mist, the dragon disappeared. There was a crack as Danny flew into the cloud of water vapor, and as the mist cleared, his fist was clearly forced into the street. The green blood leaking from his knuckles didn't even seem to faze him at all. There was a light click of something hard coming into contact with the asphalt, and his eyes snapped open, still shining with rage.

Next to him, Drake stood.

Two four-toed dragon-like feet had replaced the human feet that had adorned his legs in their previous encounter, the dull talons clicking impatiently on the asphalt. Light black stripes covered the grey scales on his legs where they were visible beneath his black shorts, a black sleeveless shirt framing his upper body and equally striped arms. His hair had been let down from his pony tail, small patches of grey scales stamped on his cheeks below his eyes. A tail, exactly like the one in his dragon form, twitched slightly from side to side. Soft, iguana-like spines trailed down the top of the rather vertically flat tail, ending in a tuft at the end of it. The light grey and striped black combination adorned this appendage also.

All in all, he looked sorta like a mutated, hairless weretiger…

His head was cocked to the side, arms folded, golden hazel eyes dull with irritation. "Are you done yet? Because we have _other_ problems."

"RAaaaahhhhh!" He threw his head back in an explosion of radiant energy, the shrill oscillation of horror and rage making the blood run cold of anyone who heard it.

Eyes rolled again at Danny's mindless charge. "Guess not…"

But Danny appeared right in front of Drake before he could react, his fist connecting with the dragon's chest, propelling him into the wall with a grunt of pain and a poof of dust.

The ghost child didn't wait for his counterpart to recover, diving into the dusty cloud. Drake flew out of the mass of dust shortly afterwards, limbs swinging randomly like a rag doll. He skipped roughly across the concrete a few times, before righting himself and assuming a cat-like 3-pointed stance.

"Man, are you having your period or something? 'Cause you're really—URK!"

_WHAM!_

Drake righted himself out of a dumpster, spitting out a mouthful of blood to one side as a banana peel fell off his now-disheveled hair. "This is REALLY getting old…"

Danny charged once again, fist readied to strike, Drake finally dashing forward as well.

There was a whirl of movement, and before he knew it, the ghost boy was on the ground, face up, sprawled and no clue how he had gotten there.

"Look, I realize that you're a LITTLE bit upset about your girlfriend over there being in my mouth, (which I wasn't too happy about, either…she needs to clean her shoes…) but we have a few other BIGGER problems…"

"Wha…what?" Danny sat up. Wait…what was going on? With his confusion, his anger wavered. Pupils returned to normal as his hand rested against his skull, the sheer rage and pain in his eyes fading with the horrific green glow.

Drake rolled his eyes once more, and got into another fighting stance. However, _this_ time he was not facing Danny.

"Um…as much as I LOVE playing the role of damsel in distress… CAN I GET SOME HELP OVER HERE?"

Danny turned towards the sound of the voice that at the moment was like one he had never heard before, yet stirred some kind of primal instinct in him. His gaze shifted, and he stopped cold.

A second later, he felt his eye twitch. His breath caught in his throat, his tongue froze and refused to utter a word. His entire body iced over in confusion, his only moving limb was his eye, which continued to twitch readily. A moment later, he felt his eyes begin to burn, both from his lack of blinking as well as the frank stupidity and "unconventionality" of the whole thing…

Before him stood two men dressed as playgirl bunnies.

Complete with the fishnet stockings, high heels, strangely realistic ears coming out of their heads, identical tassels of medium-length blond hair falling over their heads like mops. They had sadistic smiles framing their faces, and there was a lusty glint in their eyes that made Danny's stomach tie itself in a knot.

One was holding a still thoroughly Sam firmly with both hands, the other smiling gaily at the odd pair a few tens of yards away.

"Ooo, we have another fine one!" the first one said so gleefully it gave Danny the urge to hurl. "I love the white hair! It's just so sexy!"

Danny blinked once more, before he felt his insides implode on itself. "Friends of yours?" he squeaked.

Drake sighed. "Sadly, yes. They just won't freakin' DIE…"

"I have to say," said the second bunny, "this girl is awfully cute too…it's too bad we couldn't keep her for ourselves…"

The other sighed, looking longingly at the half dragon and ghost, before turning back to his companion. "Well, we _are_ on a schedule after all. Better hop to it!"

Danny's face went blank. "Did they just make the pun I thought they did?"

"That's an unusually _good_ one this time around, too…" Drake muttered, shaking his head sadly.

The ghost kid rubbed his head once more. "I still don't understand what the heck is going on…"

"It'll end soon enough, one way or another."

Danny stood up abruptly. "Oh, I know how this is going to end!" Rising into the air, he shot like a bullet towards the two gender-confused kidnappers. "With both of you going down!"

He charged as Drake's palm connected with his forehead. "This is getting repetitive…" he muttered.

Phantom charged, eyes blazing once again with a fiery glow. The two men looked at him in astonishment, before the second one, the one not holding Sam, grinned.

He rushed blindly at his foe, hands clenching into fists ready to pummel these freaks who had kidnapped Sam. Fist coiled back, he swung.

Only to get a high-heeled shoe kick in the neck. Luckily, the point and toe had been on opposite sides of his neck, so that he didn't get a puncture from it, but it still sent him reeling backwards so fast that he skidded along the ground for quite some time before coming to rest in the street where he and Drake had originally been fighting.

Drake leaned down, apparently unmoved from before the ghost child had hurled himself into battle. "Do you _always_ charge in head first like that?"

"Is it any of your business?" Danny challenged, grunting as he righted himself.

"It seems….effective…." Drake observed sarcastically.

"Well, if you actually ARE on my side, why don't you HELP me then, eh?"

"No need at the moment."

"What?"

His reply was the slightest inclination of his right eyebrow and a smirk, before the dragon looked upwards. Danny followed his gaze with his own before he was rewarded with the sight of a flying black-robed figure, floating about 100 yards above the school.

A long-haired blond one.

"Oh, for crying out—" Danny started. "You two BOTH have superpowers?"

His only response was an "I know something you don't know" smile that bloomed on Drake's face.

The second bunny sprang at Drake, feet tucked against his body and ready to spring a punishing blow. The dragon easily dodged sideways, the bunny's kick slicing the asphalt beneath them, leaving two giant punctures identical to the ones Danny had found earlier.

_So that's what caused all the damage from before…_Danny thought to himself. He glanced upwards once more, seeing the floating figure holding her hands above her head, a look of concentration carving out her features.

The attacking bunny kept on swinging his legs at Drake; however few of the blows landed. He was bending in ridiculous fashions, his incredible flexibility allowing him to flip and roll all around his frustrated opponent. Finally, he looked upwards towards. He smiled suddenly, and launched at his enemy.

The heel of his palm connected with his opponent's sternum, pushing a startled gasp out his mouth. Then, with a simple motion, Drake tensed his body, and blew his foe away with a titanic blast of water.

Much to Danny's horror, the blast was heading right towards Sam.

Before he could move however, the torrent of water smashed into the spot where the other bunny had been keeping a firm hold on her. He let out a startled yelp, quickly going under the flood of liquid engulfing him.

"You idiot!" Danny roared. "Why the hell did you do that! You just killed Sam!"

"Danny!"

"Why did you fire a blast at them when they had a hostage!"

"**Danny**!"

"Quiet Sam, I'm trying to give them a piece of my mind!" Danny hushed. "You just—"

He turned, seeing Sam perfectly ok, albeit wet, but unharmed nonetheless.

"How…?" his face went blank. "Karimia?"

As a response, she merely smirked.

Drake padded over to where their previous foes lay unconscious in puddles of mud and water, dusting his arms off as he shook his head sadly. "I'm really starting to hate bunny demons…" he muttered under his breath.

"Demons?" Sam blurted.

Karimia nodded. "Why else do you think they could do that," she pointed at the indents in the street and ground, "with titanium high-heeled shoes?"

"I'm gonna need YEARS of therapy for this…" Danny said sourly as he felt his eye twitch again, ineffectively trying to stop it by smacking his hand to the unruly area of his face. "So how often have you had to fight these guys?"

"Alone like this? Not very often. But these guys are just more creepy than anything else," Karimia said half seriously.

Sam shivered, looking uncharacteristically. "Can I go change? I'm freezing here…"

Danny started for her, planning to use his intangibility to phase her out of it, but instead Drake made a simple motion with his hands and all of the water lifted off of her, as if by magic. It shifted into a floating sphere of water, before it floated over to his hands and seemingly absorbed into them.

"That's a neat trick," Danny said half to himself, eyes widened slightly in wonder. "Can you do that Karimia?"

"It's actually Senka," she monotoned. "And no, I can't."

Sam, realizing she wasn't just staring at the water, had a quick blush before she turned to Karimia. "No kidding. What exactly ARE you guys, anyways?"

Senka's eyes drifted over to Drake, who looked thoughtful for a moment before he shrugged. "I think it would be better if we talked about this in another place," Senka said. "I don't really know where the police are right now, but it's only going to be a matter of time before they show up."

"They always arrive conveniently AFTER the battle is over…"

Senka elbowed Drake for the comment, rewarded with a slight yelp of pain, but started towards the back of the school. Strangely enough, a set of bat-like wings and a thin tail ending in a spade adorned her. Danny was surprised that he hadn't noticed them before…perhaps it was because of their previous angle.

"Follow us," Senka instructed. "Oh, and Danny?"

"Yeah?"

"You might want to go invisible for this…"

"What about you two?"

"We've got it covered."

Drake squatted slightly, allowing for Senka to grab him around the waist from behind, and with an enormous beat of her wings, she took off.

"So HOW is that not suspicious?" Sam asked. To this Danny just shrugged his shoulders. He picked Sam up from around the waist, went invisible, then followed after them.

About fifteen seconds into the flight, there was a flash of black around the strange duo flying ahead of them. After it faded, it looked like a raven was coasting on the breeze, free of any earthly worries; soaring its life away.

Danny followed the "raven" for some time, farther and farther away from the school and his familiar neighborhood. To this he paid little mind. Trying to sift through the jumble of thoughts and such in his head was no easy task, and he wanted to know exactly WHY these strange new faces had appeared at that time.

Flying often helped, and this easy coasting through the air cleansed his thoughts.

One thing was obvious: they weren't fully human. He hadn't seen Karimia's….Senka's, powers as of yet, but he didn't get a feeling that he could take both her and Drake on at the same time if worst came to worst. She could obviously fly quickly: probably how she got Sam away from those tights-wearing freaks, and for that at least, he was thankful. As for Drake…Drake alone had been able to make such a fool out of him, and make short work of the two bunnies…

Where _were_ they now, anyways? Did the police take them in? They had just left them there….

His thoughts wandered back to his fight with the dragon, a slight burning jealousy started in his chest, but he quelled it. All in all, he had inflicted some damage, as the mental image of Drake spitting out blood confirmed…he had practically wiped the street with dragon hide, yet in that last clash, when he had actually countered…what had happened?

Had he made some stupid mistake that blasted dragon had exploited? Or was he truly that weak…?

How powerful WERE they, anyways? When he had (possibly mistakenly) attacked Drake, it appeared that he had taken him off guard, which was most likely why he had succeeded in landing so many blows right at first…

"Uh, Danny?"

Sam's voice snapped him out of his thoughts, earning a slight jolt of surprise out of him. "Oh, sorry Sam, I was just trying to figure these guys out."

"It's ok," she replied with a slight smile. "But do you mind holding me different?"

Silence. Sam waited, but still nothing. She turned her neck as far as she could, and saw a look on Danny's face that resembled a bug-eyed fish.

He caught his breath that he hadn't realized had escaped him, then swallowed hard. "What?" he asked; flabbergasted.

"Well, I feel like you're going to drop me…and I know you won't," she said to counter the look on his face, "but I'd just feel more comfortable if you held me a little different."

"Ok…well, how do you want me to hold you?" _God_, that sounded wrong…He was incredibly grateful that Tucker wasn't here…he had given them enough strife with the whole "fake out make out" incidents…this would just take the cake for him…

Sam was blushing hard; Danny could only hope that he was only half as beet red as she was. "Well… 'Bridal style'?"

"Um…sure…" Was that all he could manage? Here was the girl that he had just gone completely mad over because he had thought she was dead, the girl of his dreams (_wow, that sounded cliché…_he thought to himself) asking to be held bridal style in his arms, and all he could squeak out was "um, sure".

His love life in the future was doomed. He just knew it…

He slowed his traveling slightly, and slid an arm beneath her legs, his other arm going into the middle of her back. "B-better?" he stuttered.

"Yes, thank you." Smiling, blushing, and her eyes shining all at once, they were at the perfect distance and angle to—

"Hey lovebirds!" Danny cursed inwardly.

"We're not lovebirds!" they both said in unison.

The raven illusion sweatdropped, then faded into a hovering Senka and Drake both sweatdropping simultaneously. "You're in one another's arms in flight, with non one else around, blushing like crazy, and you're _not_ lovebirds…Whatever…" Senka said with a wave of her wing that must have been an equivalent to a wave of the hand. "Now, go through that wall there," she continued, pointing with her long black tail towards a rather run-down building that had many cracks running up its walls.

Danny's face went even paler than its usual ghostly white, if possible. This was Valerie Gray's apartment complex…

Drake raised an eyebrow in an inquiring stare, but he turned away as the two of them flew through the wall with a puff of black energy.

"That was interesting…" Sam commented.

"Not everyday you see someone go through a wall…"

Sam looked at him inquiringly with a quirked eyebrow. "At least like _that_ at any rate…"

She shrugged, and the two of them flew in after the equally strange duo ahead of them.

Danny hoped to god that they'd make this worth the trip…and the danger…

After all, Valerie wasn't known to be merciful to ghosts…

Dragons, and otherwise, probably weren't much better off.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

**Hey all, quickie author's note. Ok, for one thing, I'm really sorry if I've made it seem like my characters, Senka and Miaho, are Mary Sues (meaning perfect in every way). I have a purpose for making them seem really powerful right at first, so don't fret, I'm not adding in gods or anything. This story is about Danny **

**And I'm also sorry for leaving a cliffhanger like this, but I wanted to divide this one up, I'll update as soon as I can, which shouldn't be too long since it's summer now :P**

**As always, constructive criticism is always appreciated!**

**Peace out!**

**Dak**


	5. Chapter 5

**smacks forehead Oops, forgot disclaimer: I don't own Danny phantom, but I DO own Drake, Senka, Sarah, and all characters who are associated with them…**

**Including the bunny demons, as scary as that is…**

**0.0**

**Other than that, no author's notes. Enjoy!**

**A single drop**

Things were calm in the apartment. Well, as calm as they could have been the crowd that now inhabited it.

Drake was crouching next to a ratty couch in an almost toad-like style, his thick reptilian tail swaying form side to side ever so slightly. Senka sat on said couch, elbow resting on an armrest, her face molded into an expression of boredom; her tail too, if one looked, was swaying from side to side. Tucker had been summoned not too long after they had arrived there, though he didn't seem all too happy about it. His thumbs "fidgeting" slightly, (it looked more like they were thumbing some sort of combination of buttons on a game controller…) and eyes darting between Drake and Senka, he reminded Danny of a jittery bug who was between two bug zappers. Sam, trying to maintain her gothic emotional distance, leaned on a chair that the ghost child now resided in.

Danny himself, now in his human form, sat lodged in the musty old chair that he felt belonged in a garage sale, his face somewhere between a little pissed and a little scared. He had no idea if Valerie's ghost hunting equipment was online at the moment; and worse yet he had no idea what the heck these people had wanted him for…power, evil redemption? Something worse?

And why the heck had he and Sam agreed to Tucker coming along? It was worse enough that Sam was here in possible danger, Tucker didn't need to be too…he shook his head. Sometimes stupid decisions were made, that was a fact, but it was always ones that ended up getting other people getting hurt.

Funny how all the bad ones were always his _own_…

"Sorry I kept you waiting…" a smooth female voice snapped him out of his thoughts. "Just making some final adjustments to our lore log…"

"No, those were PRE-final adjustments…" Senka muttered darkly. "Otherwise you would have been in there for _more_ than an hour…"

The oriental woman huffed. "What? It's good to stay informed…"

Drake cocked an eyebrow, a heave of a sigh escaping his chest. "It wasn't more information on _Inky_, was it?"

"Or was it just more fanfiction?" Senka smirked.

The other woman's reaction was to turn beet red.

"Fanfiction?" Danny, Sam, and Tucker blurted at once.

A rush of blood made it to Drake's face, being quite obvious despite the presence of shiny grey scales on his cheeks. "You don't need to know…"

"Imagine people writing stories about you for their amusement…" Senka started anyways.

The dragon sighed. "And then it turns into a really bad smut-novel like plot…" he added dryly.

"Hey! Those were _quality_ pieces of _artistic_ writing!" she countered.

"Whatever, Sarah," Senka continued, waving her hand dismissively. "You're addicted to badly-written smut, enough said…"

"Does this discussion HAVE to be in front of _them_?" Sarah hissed through clenched teeth, her face heating up all the more.

"At least it wasn't the slash fic…or WAS it?" Both Senka and Drakes snapped their gazes over towards Sarah. She shrugged helplessly.

Drake glanced at the goldfish-like expressions of the trio in front of them. "I suppose we should get back on topic…" he rapped a claw-like fingernail against his chin in thought. "Then again, at least they weren't there for the 'little' burping contest…"

The two women blanched. "Aw, jeez, Drake, do you HAVE to bring that up?"

The dragon shrugged helplessly, still squatting, in a cute fashion. "It was funny…"

"Until Inky burped a fireball and burned a hole in the roof…"

All three winced at Senka's comment.

Tucker jabbed his finger at them heatedly. "Okay, as funny as that sounds, I really need to know a few things! I know that you two are Senka and Drake, since Danny said you were the freaky ones…"

Two said "freaks" sent death glares towards said ghost child, Senka even rising out of her position on another couch to fold her arms in her robe and glare down at them. Said ghost child shrugged helplessly while defending himself with "I had to speak his language."

"Who's Inky?" Tucker continued, ignoring Danny.

"Sarah's boyfriend, an incubus," Senka said before Sarah could put in a comment.

"A flaming incubus," Drake smirked. He paused a moment when he got no reaction out of the three of them, and then added "He controls fire…it was a joke…"

"Your jokes are worse than Danny's…" Sam muttered.

"Hey! I can be funny when I want to be!"

"Being funny isn't the same as being able to crack a joke, dude. Funny is when you phase your pants off in public. Cracking a joke is like saying that the chicks of the world hate Dash Baxtor."

"Tucker…Girls DO hate Dash…"

Silence.

"At least those of us with _half_ of a mind…" Sam grumbled

"Ahem." Tucker cleared his throat. "…anyways…I must ask who this FINE young lady right before me is?"

"My name's Sarah."

"Ah. My name's Tucker. Tucker Foley. TF for—"

_GONK!_

"Enough with the bad pick-up lines!" Danny and Sam shouted in unison.

"And I thought WE had problems…" Drake muttered.

Senka rolled her eyes, a sparkle of annoyance gracing her icy blue orbs. "We do!"

His face blanked. "Not as bad as theirs…anyways…" he said, gesturing that the slight jumble the three of them had begun. He cleared his throat. "Ok… (moving on from the slapstick violence…) you want to find out more about us, right?"

The three stopped cold, then immediately sat down on the couch without so much as a peep, intent on learning as much as they could about their new peers.

Sarah drew in a deep sigh. "Ok, let's start with what YOU know, and we can fill in the blank parts."

There was an awkward silence for a moment, the three of them shifting around nervously. "Well…" Danny started, his fingers scratching the skin under his hair on the back of his head. "…we know he's a dragon…" he said while pointing at Drake.

Drake resumed his crouch, which appeared quite comfortable for him, and sent a blank look back at the ghost child.

"And we know that the two of them are some sort of superheroes…" Sam added.

"Or villains…" Danny muttered.

Much to his surprise, this earned no visible reaction from any of their three listeners. Were they expecting it? With a slight sigh leaking out through his lips, his gaze hardened. Despite what their intentions might have been, he was still holding onto the suspicions that this could be a trap.

And WHY had they agreed to Tucker coming again? God, he felt stupid…another mistake to go on the list of many…

After a pause, Senka used her hand to motion for them to continue. "And…?"

"That's about it, other than Drake can send tidal waves out of his hands," Danny finished.

The three of them stood in an awkward silence for a moment, each seeming to ponder their own view of what should be said. "Wow…that leaves a lot of stuff uncovered…" Drake scratched the back of his head, strands of this thick hair falling about his fingers in an abstract caress. "Who wants to start?"

Sarah sighed. "Well, if neither of _you_ want to…"

"You're the 'leader.'"

She glowered at the winged girl's comment. "Alright then, I'll start."

She then proceeded with the story, as dubious as it sounded. Apparently, from what they had said, they were from an alternate timeline, one free of the severe ghost influence that this one possessed. Much like Danny's world, a portal had opened up, but instead of to the realm of the dead, it opened up to another dimension, known as the "dragon realm." This portal, she explained, was ripped open by a mass of excess magic from that realm, and as it passed through the dimensional membrane, different elements of it had "unfiltered," like sunlight through a prism.

Drake, or "_Miaho_," (**A/N: "Mee-AH-hoh"**) rather, had inherited the powers of water, and thus his appearance had altered to allow him to control it. Senka had inherited the powers of darkness, and so her body had changed to look like one of a succubus. The mentioned infamous Inky was an incubus; a pyrotechnic.

"Wait, you're a succubus?" Tucker blurted at that moment. "You mean one of those sex demons that…does it to a guy…then steals their soul?"

Senka's eyebrows lowered. "Yes…"

He eyed her over again. "So…why aren't you wearing something a little more…alluring?" he sensually purred, (which was a very disturbing tone of voice, if Danny said so himself,) wiggling his eyebrows.

Miaho looked at him with a blank expression of surprise, before a smug look came over his features. _You're _**SO**_ dead,_ he mouthed.

The dangerous black glow came to Senka's eyes, her long blond hair rising up in a brief torrent of wind, and the overall murderous look on her face, which normally would have caused the ghost king to cower in a corner, was much more than enough to make the inquisitive teen shrink away.

After a snort of mirth, the half dragon laid a hand on her shoulder, and after a brief second where she held up her hand with dark flames from it, she calmed, the invisible torrent of energy fading into nothing.

Sarah blinked at the duo standing next to her, and a long whistle of admiration leaked out of her lips. "Too bad you couldn't have done that for Inky…it took forever to rebuild that wall…"

"Huh?" their audience chorused.

"Last time someone brought up that point, she blasted them through a concrete wall…" Drake muttered, a somewhat embarrassed expression gracing his features.

"Ok…" Tucker trembled, "I'm writing a note of that on my PDA…"

"I'm just glad Inky has a hard of a head as he does…" Miaho continued.

"Hey, he's not THAT thick-headed…" Sarah retorted, her arms folded defensively. "He has his moments…as do YOU, Drake!"

"Well excuse me, but I never burned my own _pants_ off in a tantrum…" the dragon snorted.

The three of them began a more heated round of bickering, which included (but was not limited to) mentions of explosive flatulence, missile toes, "enhanced prosthetics to increase performance," water balloon fights, purging of the toilet gone awry, and numerous other instances that the ghost child and his friends couldn't even comprehend.

"Are you always this crazy?" Danny interrupted.

The three froze for a moment, glancing at each other with inquisitive expressions, before shifting their communal gaze back towards the trio seated on the couch.

"No."

"No."

"No."

"We're usually worse," Senka stated flatly. "This is the bare bones expression of what it's like to live in a crowded household of rambunctious hormone-driven teenagers with super powers."

This earned a collective blink.

"Oh-ho _Kay_, then…" Danny started. "So what do you want ME for?"

Sarah turned towards Miaho and Senka, both of whom motioned for her to continue. She glared at them, obviously pissed at the assumed role of "leader" that they had forced her into, but she acquiesced (albeit grudgingly) and continued.

From their own timeline, which apparently had a small connection to the ghost zone, the Arch-ghost Clockwork informed them of a possible threat via a powerful alliance of those who should stay separate, a.k.a. villains. They had been told that there were some beings from their own timeline that had already invaded the ghost zone through that connection, and had stolen the Fenton thermos that had served as a prison for one of the most feared beings in the entirety of the ghost world.

"Dan…" The word had escaped Danny's mouth before he was able to stop himself. He glanced up at Sarah, though she continued on as if nothing had happened. Senka, however, noticed, though she said nothing, allowing their 'leader' to continue.

"The bunny demons that you fought earlier are part of that alliance, so it seems…" Sarah grumbled.

"Well, considering how easily you dealt with them," Tucker pointed out, "It sounds like all that we'll have to worry about is the ghosts, right?"

Sarah shook her head sadly. "It's not that simple. I'm sure that that ghost who was in the Fenton thermos (whatever the hell that is) is indeed powerful, but that's not all of it. We have some villains from our side that are practically gods, they're so powerful."

"Daron went missing right after a giant rampage of his before we came here…" Senka's voice was hardly a whisper.

"Daron?"

Miaho grunted as his joints cracked when he stood up, massaging the slight cramps in his thighs as he stood. "He's a were-chimera. A freaking powerful one at that, too."

"Chimera in the mythological sense (1), or like the ultimate blending of animals sense?" Sam asked, not quite sure if she wanted the answer to it.

"I suppose both," Sarah said.

"How powerful are we talking, here? I mean, is he just like a dog-bear or something?"

Sarah shook her head once more. "No Tucker. He's far more dangerous than any mortal creature. Imagine the head of a dragon with some sort of breath-derived energy weapon that we haven't even been able to figure _out_ yet, two sets of crab-like arms, and a 100-foot long (as a low estimate) centipede body with sets of insect wings on his back, ending in a nice scorpion tail. THAT is the type of dangerous we're talking about."

"He's a magical creature, too."

"Meaning…?"

Drake heaved another heavy sigh. "Think about it this way: all of us here are mortal creatures: the traditional laws of physics apply to us and everything in our bodies. His own _chemistry_ is based on magic: he's a lot stronger than any creature should be. And due to his magical nature, conventional weapons don't work against him very well."

"He has a human form, too, that seems no different than anyone else," Senka added. "The worst part is, is that he face-shifts in his human form, so we can never keep track of him."

"Every time we come close to nabbing him he just changes his identity, so it's back to square one."

Miaho's comment loomed in the air, promoting an awkward silence in the group. However, it was Danny's next comment that truly struck a nerve.

"There's another one, isn't there?"

The black-haired woman nodded solemnly. "Not quite as scary, but it's still a pretty hard foe."

Sam blinked. "'It'?"

"Battlerex, whatever you want to name it, it's still a dinosaur on _steroids_…" Senka growled. "Twice the size, durability like you wouldn't believe, breathes fire..." she muttered as she counted abilities on her fingers.

Tucker snickered. "Does it have _explosive flatulence_, too?"

All other sets of eyes either glared or stared blankly at him.

"What? It's a plausible question…"

Ignoring Tucker's comment, the blue-eyed boy continued. "This just keeps on getting better, doesn't it?" Danny sighed. "Is that it, as far as you know?"

"Those are the only ones that we actually KNOW of…there could be more…" Sarah shrugged helplessly. "We're giving you all the information that we have, honestly."

"Ok, well what do you think we should do, then?"

Light glinted off of Drake's twin fangs. "Train."

A slight stir of frustration and anger welled in Danny's chest at Miaho's laconic comment. "Train? You're hearing about a possible most evil alliance ever and all you can say is that you'll train for it?"

"Not me." He grinned, revealing several pointed teeth, not the least of which were his over-developed fangs. "You."

"WHAT!" Danny exploded. "WHY!"

"It only takes a single drop of water to overflow a dam, Danny." For a moment, all of the lines on Miaho's face deepened, the shine of his eyes fading, hair seeming to lighten in color right before Danny's eyes. He looked…old…experienced…broken…

A sad smile budded on the half-dragon's face. "We can't win this fight alone, Danny. We need you."

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

His floating was interrupted. A pity, since he _so_ enjoyed floating…

He mentally slapped himself. How far had he fallen? His intellect had been divided so many times over that there had been nothing left, just a dizzy drooling idiot floating in an artificial tube.

Dan was rudely roused from his sleep as he felt a powerful suction pulling at his feet. The unnatural shell of this imbecilic persona slowly flowing away, his eyes snapped open.

He was awake.

The world before him flooded into sight, a brilliance of color that momentarily blinded him for a moment. Then, as the figures came into sight, a sadistic grin bloomed on his face.

An elegant, fair hand was offered out to him, and his red eyes glanced down at it for a second, the grin of his face deepening.

His _time_ was at hand…

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

**I love these cliffhangers too much... (grins) I'm sorry, but I just love em, heheh.**

**(Dodges gigantic wave of thrown rocks) Ack! Don't hurt me! I bruise easily!**

**1) Hey all, for those of you who might be confused about the chimera stuff; I'll explain it to you:**

**The mythological chimera is a fire-breathing blending of three animals: usually a lion, snake, and goat, though sometimes there are cases of bird parts instead of goats too. The "blending of animals" chimera can be just about anything: a 3 headed dragon to a monkey-lizard-dodo bird. Daron, of course, is a tad more dangerous than those things, heheh.**

**As an FYI, I'm going on vacation for the next week and a half soon, so I'm going to try to update again before I leave, however things are really hectic here, and it may be difficult. Sorry for your wait.**

**Anyways, thanks a lot for your reviews! They keep me going!**

**Dak**


	6. Chapter 6

**Wow…it's been a while, hasn't it? (sweatdrop) man, I hate being so inconsistent…**

**Anyways, my apologies for having this chapter being so lame, however I figured that you had waited long enough and tried to update as fast as I could, so… enjoy! **

**To Love and to Hate**

This. Class. Sucked.

Monday morning found Danny sitting, glowering and agitated, in Mr. Lancer's class. Chin resting on his desk, he struggled to pay attention to Mr. Lancer's droning, however his mind refused to work.

Why the hell was his life so darned screwed up? Ghosts alone had been bad enough…but now dragons and demons, too, for that matter…

Not to mention he could feel Drake laughing at him with those eyes…those strange and exotic eyes that seemed to attract a lot of girls, whom he very bluntly (and arrogantly) refused, eyes that sparkled with that something that let you know there was something more to him…

Senka was obviously hiding something, too; what the hell was HER power, anyways? She was obviously the weaker of the two, since she had gone to save Sam and left the fighting to Drake…That made sense, at least. Perhaps--

_SLAM!_

"**Mr. Fenton!**"

"Uh…?"

"I realize that the discussion of constellations and the stories behind them can be slightly taxing, however I would appreciate you NOT sleeping in my class!"

Danny shook himself out of his daze caused by the slammed dictionary that had suddenly appeared on his desk, and banished the sounds of his laughing classmates out of his mind.

He needed a vacation…

In what seemed like seconds later for his troubled mind, the bell rang and students began leaving the room, murmurs of fashion, sports, and other popular subjects permeating the air around him. Truly degrading to the intellect…Danny suddenly snorted in mirth, reminiscing how he, at one point, would have given almost anything to be popular and be respected.

He practically jumped out of his skin when a hand rested on his shoulder.

Miaho, now in his human disguise, smiled down at him.

"Come on, we need to start," he said simply.

"Start what?"

The dragon didn't answer, and only started out of the room. He paused in the doorway, looking over his shoulder. "Do you have anything going on after school?"

"Um…no…why?"

"I'll meet you at your house, then. Wear something that you don't mind getting a little dirty." And with that, he left; Senka following shortly afterwards after an apologetic look towards Danny, and a glare aimed at Miaho.

A dumbfounded Danny righted himself up from his desk. Arrogant bastard...

Sam and Tucker stared at where Drake had once been, both shaking their heads in confusion. "You want us to come with you?"

"No!" Danny immediately snapped, then, realizing how he must have sounded, he lowered his voice. "No…if these guys are truly dangerous, I don't want you guys to be in the crossfire." The ghost child heaved a heavy sigh, his brow furrowing and a determined frown molding his mouth. "I'm going alone this time, and finally find out what these guys are up to."

"They already told us on Saturday, Danny," Sam pointed out. "You are being a little quick to judge, I think."

"We don't know if they're actually on our side or not, Sam. They're not telling us everything…Can't you tell?"

Sam started to object, however her progress towards Danny was stopped as Tucker held his hand out, uncharacteristically silent.

Danny gave Tucker a silent thank you with his eyes, then started out after Miaho, his false mask of confidence more to reassure himself, rather than his friends.

"He's got this one Sam," Tucker said softly. "We'll only get in his way…"

Sam opened her mouth to retaliate, but then suddenly realized that Mr. Lancer was still sitting at his desk, apparently now reading some Shakespeare. Instead, she huffed, and followed Tucker as he left the room. For once, Tucker mused, he was glad he wasn't involved in a relationship…Sam's face resembled one that yelled "if he doesn't get killed I'm going to kill him when he gets back."

As he laughed silently to himself, Mr. Lancer glanced up from his book, Macbeth, and a small smile appeared on his features.

"Ah…things happen all too fast…" He laughed to himself, and continued to read on in the story, wondering if there might possibly be another wonder that would be remembered as widely known as Shakespeare…

Or, he suddenly thought, like Stalin or Hitler…

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

Danny arrived to an empty home, so as such he felt absolutely no qualms about letting loose a large belch into the air of his house. He scratched lazily, still tired from his consistent lack of sleep, and let his backpack flop down on the floor carelessly. He actually had no homework immediately due, for once, and was looking forward to a nice night off…

At least after Drake had his little say…

That damned lizard hadn't really said when he was coming over: probably safe to assume later rather than sooner, since he, too, probably had homework to finish. He yawned; kicking off his shoes, and fell into the couch.

A light sigh escaped his lips, and he relaxed, sinking deeper into the sofa.

"Comfortable?"

Danny practically jumped off of the couch at the voice. He looked frantically around for the source of it, but his initial search bore no fruit. That is, until he happened to look up and see the smiling golden eyes on his ceiling.

"How are you doing that?" Danny asked.

"Doing what?"

"Hanging from my ceiling?"

The dragon smiled, his tail twitching in amusement. "Think of me as a…draconic-Spiderman…"

"You mean a waterlogged one?"

At this the dragon only shrugged, and dropped down from the ceiling, and after a flip, he landed on his feet a lot like a cat.

"We need to start."

"Would you quit that stupid ominous thing?" Danny practically snarled, "I don't understand what you're trying to tell me!"

"Ah, but what would be the fun in that?" Miaho grinned. "It's oh-so boring if I just told you right off…"

"You're getting me _really_ ticked off…" Danny growled.

"Oh, don't get your panties in a bunch…" Miaho scoffed. "I know that you're confused about this whole thing, so, I'm going to give you any and all answers to the questions that you have."

Danny blinked. "That was rather blunt…"

"I'm known for that…" Miaho mumbled, but he quickly regained his composure. "However, we need a private place for me to…relay all of this…"

"Why did you ask me to wear clothes that I didn't mind messing up?"

"You'll see…"

"Oh, come on! You just said you'd answer all my questions!"

A Cheshire-cat smile appeared on the dragon's face. "But I never said when!"

"…"

Miaho laughed at Danny's fuming. "Oh, come now, you can't take a little joke? Besides, we need to move to a place that can take a little damage…"

"Like…?" the ghost child waved his hand in such a way that he obviously wanted the dragon to continue.

"The ghost zone."

Danny nearly jumped out of his skin at the new voice.

The dragon smirked, but then mock scolded the perpetrator of the voice. "Now, we don't need any of that, Senka. He's already scared out of his wits…"

The succubus shrugged as she exited her dark portal, closing it with the sound of a vacuum cleaner behind her. "I make the creepy entrances…"

Danny blinked. "What the heck was _that_?"

Both looked in confusion. "What was what?"

"That dark thingy that she just popped in through!"

"Oh, that would be a 'dark portal.'" Senka explained. "Think of it like a mage's portal."

"Ok…but HOW do you do that?" Danny rubbed his temples. "This is really confusing…"

"Look, if I just told you everything right now, you'd get all confused…" Miaho muttered. Then, after eyeing Danny, he added "Well…MORE confused…"

"That makes me feel SO much better…"

"Relax, Danny," Senka said. "We just need to get to a spot where no one can spy on us."

Flustered and practically pulling out his own hair, Danny took a deep breath as if to calm himself down, but then yelled a thundering "WHY!"

"You understand so little…" Miaho muttered.

"Because you don't tell me anything and keep up this stupid ominous thing that annoys the heck out of me!"

"He's got a point, Miaho…"

After a huffy scoff, he growled, "Just get us a portal, neh?"

"Fine."

Senka's eyes closed in concentration for a moment, before her hands took on the dark… "Aura" for lack of a better word, that Danny had seen them take on briefly before in with their previous encounter.

In a slow and deliberate motion, she opened her arms wide, as if to accept some long-forgotten lover back into her arms, before a slight rippled distended the air in front of her.

Nothing happened for a moment, but before Danny could point this out, a slight swirling black mass appeared at the center of the air distension, and expanded outwards much like a vertical hurricane.

Complete with its own set of light winds, too, Fenton observed.

Senka let out a light sigh, an indication that her work was complete, and waited for a moment. Miaho, without a second thought, progressed into the portal, the swirling black mass accepting his form greedily into its midst. Senka gave him a slight bump from behind. He turned back towards her in surprise, unable to hide his uneasiness about the vortex in front of him.

She smirked. "It's not going to eat you…at least not in the traditional sense…"

"What—"

Before he could fully respond, she gave him a light shove into the portal.

And into darkness.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

"I'm a lumberjack, yes I am!"

_GONK!_ "Hey! _I_ was going to sing that!"

"Well, you can sing it AFTER _I_ sing it."

"No fair, you JUST sang it!"

"So? I have a better vrebrato (sp?) than _you_ could _ever_ manage!"

"Not true!" _Pow!_

_Gonk! Slap! Bam! Bam! Bam!_

Dan rested his forehead between his thumb and pointer finger, an exasperated sigh escaping his dead lips. Those stupid bunnies were going to be the end of his sanity if they kept this up. If it wasn't their stupid bickering over the stupidest subjects, (such as Monty Python and/or Michael Jackson songs…) it was their quick make-ups and then make-_outs_ shortly thereafter…

"Why do you keep _them_ around? They're so useless…"

"Ah, Dan, that is why you were defeated by a _child_…" a smooth voice answered him. "Every plan requires its peons."

Dan winced ever so slightly at the mention of his defeat, but quickly put the feelings beneath him. "Just the same, they get rather irritating…"

"Sticks and stones to them. But we DO need them for our plans."

"Plans that you never share with anyone else, Daron."

The figure only shrugged, and turned back to a small laptop computer sitting in his lap. Daron's appearance screamed "elegance" to anyone who saw him: in his current form, that of a young and incredibly good-looking man in his mid twenties, any girl would have drooled at his immediate sight. Lean, though muscular, and long flowing locks of semi-wavy blond hair that fell about his shoulders, yet never frizzed or puffed. His hands were uncalloused, thin, almost like that of a woman's. His long red (and rather plain) robe; more for show than for actual practicality, hung about his shoulders and off his arms to a nearly ridiculous length, yet somehow he managed to never snag it on anything.

Show off…

Dan continued to sit, irritability radiating the air around him. Daron was the patient type, a perfect leader in many ways. Never rash…never jumping to conclusions, and his mind able to work on several different problems at once, it seemed.

The "most evil ghost of all time" had been told that he would be enlightened on the parts of the plan that he needed to know, as to prevent the whole thing from being discovered by these stupid kids that the were-chimera seemed to consider so seriously. Judging this elegant man's general attitude towards these new intruders, they had been the only ones in his past to ever defeat him.

Just like his own younger and weaker self had managed to defeat _him_.

Dan growled.

He looked up to see a rather sadistic plan-maker's smile beaming back at him. "This, my young friend, is the next stage in our plans…"

Dan looked as his counterpart swiveled the computer screen around to enter his vision. And as he did so, his eyes narrowed, partly in thought, and partly in discomfort.

Every being had its place in a plan: from the king, the rook, to the pawn, just like in chess. The only thing that disturbed him was that he still didn't know what part of the plan Daron considered him.

Was he a knight? Or just a simple pawn?

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

The darkness around them was rather peaceful, though still uncomforting at the same time. Instinctually Danny transformed into his ghost self, the brief light of his transformation doing nothing to abate the darkness around him. Neither Senka nor Miaho were in his line of vision, and briefly he wondered if he had been tricked.

But just as suddenly as the darkness had appeared, it began to dissipate, and something entered his line of sight, however it was blurry, though it was obvious about one thing:

It was approaching fast.

He squinted, and took a step forward on the black nothingness beneath him, trying to make out what it was. Was that…?

BAM!

Yep…it _was_ a brick wall…

"I think that we should have told him about moving in the portal, eh?" A voice…Miaho's, stated. It was obvious that he was amused.

Of course, if you had just reappeared in the ghost zone and crashed into a brick wall within seconds of your appearance, it would have been funny. Just the same, Danny felt like killing something.

Peeling himself off of the ecto-brick surface, Danny shook his head to clear the stars from his vision, and turned around to absorb his surroundings.

The familiar green sky of the ghost zone hovered above them, a dull blanket of color as a reminder that they were no longer on the same world. All around them were ruins of some sort, devoid of anything other than black rocks that resembled the other black rocks all around them, a few puddles of water, no roof, and a great expanse of land around them.

"…THIS…is what you wanted to show me?" Danny inquired.

Miaho nodded.

Senka glanced at the water puddles on the ground, eyeing the dragon suspiciously. She was answered with a shrug, and she rolled her eyes before pulling out a book from her sleeve and sat over on a rock, legs crossed, now engrossed in a book that had a pink cover.

A rather amusing contrast to the jet black of her robes.

One of the dragon's clawed feet splashed slightly in one of the puddles, snapping the ghost child out of his thoughts.

"The reason why I brought you here was because you need training, Danny…So, I brought you here so that you and I wouldn't level Amity Park, eh?"

"Wait…level…?"

"If you're going to face someone like Daron, you need to be at the peak of your abilities. This isn't some stupid box ghost or something…"

Senka closed her book. "Just fight him so that we can go home, ok?"

Danny blinked. Miaho's arm raised high above his own head, a grin crossing his features. All around him the puddles began to vanish, the water within them literally floating up off the ground to float around in a lazy circle above the dragon's head.

One of the globs of water floated past Danny, and, curious, he poked it with a finger, watching it ripple as it continued on its path into the plethora of water balls floating around the dragon.

"Time for a rematch, Danny. Think you're up to it, boy?"

That arrogant…Danny's anger flared, taking the form of an energy ball in his right hand.

"YOU'RE ON!" he yelled, hurling the blast towards the smirking dragon.

Off to the side, Senka flipped another page of her book, looking up slightly with a look of annoyance crossed with impatience. "Men and their egos…" she muttered, turning another page of her book.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

**I promise to update ASAP, please review!**


	7. Chapter 7

**Wow…been a while, hasn't it? Heheh…(sigh) My apologies for taking so long, however school work was much harder than I expected, and I'm still trying to work out my schedule. I also apologize for the lack of quality in this one as opposed to the other chapters; however I made it long and tried to update ASAP so that people could continue reading this story, which is a ton of fun to write!**

**And with that being said, on with the fic!**

**Alliances**

The ground shook trembled slightly. Then once more, with more vibrato.

A light sigh hissed into the air. And if one were to have heard it, it would have been painfully obvious that her mood lay somewhere between "forcefully relaxed," and "murderous annoyance."

That moment found Senka sitting on a lone rock in a series of ruins about her, dust billowing around her as blasts of water and ecto-energy clashed with one another, obliterating and otherwise fracturing things around her with incredible ease that would have gotten them instant demolition jobs.

Ugh…why did men have to be so _difficult?_ She recognized Miaho's want to train Danny himself, as he, of the three of them who had come to this timeline, was the most capable "master" since he himself had been trained well in martial arts. And, like any "master," he had his own way of doing things. However at the moment…

At the moment, it seemed like all he wanted to do was blow stuff up.

Cue another gigantic explosion that sent debris everywhere.

It _was_ a good idea to see how their powers intermingled and such; since their own "abyss" attack of dark energy and water was pretty potent…adding Danny's ghost rays to the already quite volatile mix could possibly boost its power enough to defeat Daron.

_Possibly._ And probably not once and for all, either, but to, at the very least, just _stop_ him was an accomplishment in itself.

She nonchalantly moved her head to the side as a stray ghost beam streaked through the air and smashed into the wall behind her. Sighing, Senka raised a hand, a small black shield, not unlike the ones that Danny had used from time to time, arose above her head, blocking the shower of rocks accompanying the blast crashing into the wall. The rocks fell harmlessly to either side of her, landing with residual thuds that shook the earth on impact.

Another, larger, quake shook the ground even more at the same moment that another heavy sigh came out of the succubus's lips.

Men…

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

Danny mentally swore. This wasn't what he had expected at all. Well…to say that so bluntly would be a lie. He HAD expected some treachery from the newcomers…after all, who just introduced themselves to you and asked to be your friend and ally that you could rely upon with your life? But to go this FAR? Was this all that Miaho had planned? Just to try and make him look foolish, try to make him feel weak?

He growled, picking himself up off the ground with a grunt. For a scaly freak that controlled WATER, this guy was pretty tough.

He didn't have any more time to think, however; Miaho leapt high over a nearby brick wall, a black and grey spot against the unnatural green of the Ghost Zone sky. The dragon spun, releasing a whip of water in a vast, though fast, arc. Danny managed to push himself off the ground just in time before the whip clashed with the ground, leaving a slight indentation in the rock there.

How the heck was WATER doing THAT?

He shot up into the sky in random patterns, the flight path making it difficult for the dragon to hit him. As he flew, his hands filled with the green energy of his rage, and Danny threw hordes of them back at Miaho. Again and again the ecto-balls went flying about, decimating practically everything in their path: to the point where Miaho had to use a blast of water to keep from getting squished as an ancient tower came crashing down. The dragon managed to avoid most of them; however one hit him in the leg, spinning him as it blew up and causing him to land awkwardly on his shoulder.

Danny took the chance, rushing forward, however at an angle this time to avoid a straight-on attack. As he neared, Miaho looked up, a hand on the wounded shoulder, blood running down his arm.

The dragon muttered something under his breath, and the blood crusted and promptly flaked under his hand; as he brought his hand away, some flecks of dried blood stuck to his hand, while others cracked and fluttered to the ground.

Where his hand had been, his skin was spotless.

Danny's eyes widened, and a wry smirk came over the dragon's demeanor. "Water is the healing element Danny…" He flicked his hand to the side, small splats of blood flying off it to dot the black ground with the purple liquid. "I can regenerate myself and others…all life requires water to heal. And I have water in abundance. Thus, my body heals itself much faster than a normal human's," he said flatly, reciting the facts like as if he had read them in a textbook.

He grunted, snapping his shoulder back into socket, and testing his fingers.

"And as such, it also means that I probably have one of the worst curses of all time."

"What's that?"

The wry smile never left his face. "I can never die." He spun quickly, water flailing in all directions as he enveloped himself in a water cocoon, the walls of water flowing around him in a gigantic maelstrom of water. The twister of water compressed slightly, and then flattened to the point of where it was almost nothing. An eyebrow raised itself on Danny's face, before a raging torrent of water exploded into his face, smashing him into the rock face behind him with an audible crunch of stones.

Coughing and sputtering, the ghost child resorted to his human form, hacking up globes of water from his throat. Around him, the water flowed together into one spot, and Miaho stood before him without a single scratch across his body. "In all truth, Danny, Daron was right about one thing that he's told me in the past: we're different from everyone else. And once we go past that line, our humanity is often compensated."

Blue eyes gazed up at a pair of gold ones, glaring for all of their worth. "So what's your point? You've proven that you're more powerful than me…" His gaze fell to the ground what more do you want?"

"Kk…"

His sight heightened, to see a hand over the dragon's mouth, a twinkle of amusement glistening in his inhuman orbs. Then, much to Danny's surprise, he burst out laughing. But this wasn't an arrogant one like all of his previous laughs in the past. It was one of genuine amusement, one that showed his fangs as he allowed his mouth to open and express himself.

"What's so funny?"

"Aha…hahaha…oh, man, you're funny…" Miaho wiped a tear from his eye. "You honestly think that I'm powerful?"

Danny blinked. "Um…yeah…you kinda just kicked my butt right there…"

"Oh, please, Danny. I've only been winning because I've developed my powers more than you have…you don't think with your head at all, do you?" His tone wasn't particularly insulting; it was much like a teasing statement. "You like videogames, don't you?"

The ghost child righted himself on the ground, shaking his head from side to side slightly to dislodge excess water still clinging to his black locks. "Well…yes…"

"Alright then." His smile continued. "Tell me about the basic roles of a role playing game, in a group."

"Why are you asking me this?"

"Just answer me, ok? It'll help with the explanation."

"Alright…well, there are three main types, I guess…"

"Good! Now what are those?"

"Damage taker, healer, and damage dealer…"

"Yes. Now think: which type are YOU?"

"What?"

"Think power wise: what kind of hero would you be in a role playing game?"

"Well…I dunno…" That was a really good question, actually. He was so used to working on a team, he had never really thought about how he would fare in a "group" scenario. Was he someone who would go up and take all the damage? Or give it? He certainly wasn't a healer, _that_ was for sure…

"I guess…a hybrid?"

"YES!" Miaho shouted, taking Danny by surprise. "Man, you're dense…"

Danny's eyebrows lowered. "I seem to have been taking that comment a lot, lately…"

The dragon almost countered with "_well maybe you should listen to it_," but quickly decided against it. "Ok, well which kinds of heroes get complained about the most on online games? The hybrids, because always complains about how they're overpowered. I myself am a 'healer.' With direct offense I kinda suck (at least compared to my counterparts) but I can last a long time since I can regenerate."

"Were you going anywhere with this?" Danny interrupted. "Because I'm starting to get bored; and considering it's about videogames, that's really saying something."

Miaho's eyebrows lowered. "Danny, YOU are a hybrid. Part damage taker part damage dealer: you can give what you take, you have the ability to go intangible to avoid attacks, AND you have the ability to use a human form to blend in with crowds."

"So do you."

"Not really." The dragon gestured over towards Senka, who was still sitting on the other side of the floating isle of ruins. "Senka has the ability to create an illusion on herself or on another, however in order for me to blend in, I have to be close to her, and she has to concentrate on it. Have you noticed that she never wears anything revealing?"

"Um…"

"Ok, that sounded wrong, I get it. But have you noticed that she doesn't flounce around like Paullina does with skanky clothes?"

"Skanky?" Danny let out a snort of a laugh. "Is that even a word?"

"FOCUS!"

"Okay, okay…Sheesh…yes, I _have _noticed…"

"Alright. She always covers up because of the possibility of letting one of her wings be seen."

"What about her tail?"

"She can tuck it inside her pants, mate."

"…Oh…why doesn't she just use her illusions to cover it up?"

"Because it takes up energy to do so…a LOT. And she _has_ to use it on me, since my tail doesn't exactly FIT inside my pants…" Miaho said bitterly, his thick tail wagging in response.

Danny stood up, still slightly shaky. "Ok…so you actually don't have an actual human form, then…"

"None at all. At least not without help."

"So you look like that…all the time?"

Miaho shrugged slightly, his face morphing into one of sadness. "Not all of us can be as gifted as you are, Danny."

"Gifted?"

The dragon sighed, before raising his left hand. "Look."

His blue eyes looked over the clawed hand. "What? Is there something wrong with it, other than the fact you have grown fingernails?" _Claws_ would have been a better adjective, actually…

"It's THERE."

"Huh?"

"Danny, I came from a really rough past. In my time, there had recently been a world war, and a lot of the major cities were trashed. I lost my arm when I was very little in an accident. I don't really remember when I had an actual arm, but…"

His gaze lost itself on his hand for a moment, before his fingers flexed and he let it rest at his side. "But after I got these powers…including the ones of regeneration…especially the ones of regeneration…my arm grew back after a while. But I also morphed into this…thing…that you see before you."

He huffed slightly in amusement. "'With great power comes great responsibility'…I suppose nothing is truer, really. After all, I'll only have this arm as long as I have these powers…" Arm raised once more, he flexed his fingers once again. "Danny, you're probably the most powerful being that has ever existed that isn't some mindless monster. You have the choice to change yourself for the better and also the chance to live an at least semi-normal life. Don't waste that chance."

"But what about my friends, my family?" Danny countered. "I can't even beat YOU, much less help you beat Daron. How do you expect me to protect them?"

"That's because throughout all of this, you've lacked one finite thing…"

Danny groaned. More riddles… "And what's that?"

"Focus. Your attacks are powerful, but it's just an unhoned blast of energy: if you compressed it a little, then you could probably do a lot more damage. And, no offense… it's easy to tell that you haven't had any proper fighting training."

Danny grumbled slightly.

Miaho chuckled slightly, before he squatted onto the ground and began to carve his finger through the dust. "The combination of all elements in one's being is what allows ultimate focus, Danny. The team that I'm a part of back in my timeline has a representative to every element, which is one reason why together we can fight so efficiently."

His fingers continued through the soil; more runes and symbols appeared, and as he completed each one, they seemed to glow slightly as he went on. Danny noticed that it was making a gradual circle, and each symbol seemed to carve out a slight portion of it, much like a slice of pie.

"Water is the element of life," Miaho said quietly, one of the runes glowing a soft blue as he spoke. "It has both the ability to restore life as well as take it away, and can allow beings a second chance." He moved to the side, and the blue rune, a soft curvy symbol that reminded Danny of a figure eight, slowly floated upwards to hover about 2 feet off the ground.

Another rune appeared on the ground. "Darkness is the element of separation and the unknown. Senka's powers come from her ability to control voids." At Danny's inquiring gaze, he explained. "It's the rapid pressure changes that she creates with them that allows her so much power…it sucks in the air, or whatever is there at that moment, with incredible power to equalize the pressure within itself. But since that action also makes an imbalance of pressure outside, it immediately makes an explosion."

"So what about the portals?" Danny inquired. "How does she make those?"

The dragon merely shrugged. "We haven't figured it out yet…at least from a scientific standpoint. It's some kind of 4-dimentional warp having to do with voids and time and space and crap…" The dragon paused a moment, deep in thought, before he shook himself out of it. "Makes my head hurt," he joked.

Danny simply rose one of his eyebrows, obviously not amused.

"Darkness isn't something to be feared, really, if you think about it," the dragon started again. "Humanity is just so bent on its ways that it refuses to look into the different places that they're not comfortable. Darkness is deceitful, but it isn't 'evil.' It's there as a barrier until someone is ready to cross it."

"Sort of like a door that keeps someone in until they're ready to leave?"

He nodded. "Exactly. Fire," he said as a red rune popped up to float next to him, "is the element of rebirth. It can be used to destroy, and can burn everything in its path out of existence. But with everything that burns, ashes are left in its place. And in its path of destruction, it allows something new to come along and replace it after sprouting from those ashes."

"That sounds a lot like the phoenix junk…" Danny said half to himself.

Miaho shrugged. "It _is_, really. The phoenix is reborn every time it is consumed by its own fires, then rises out of the ashes. Earth," a light brown symbol rose from the ground as he spoke, "is the element tradition and strength. It is the foundation on which everything else is based upon. It is shaped by the other elements: wind and water, fire and light, and so on, and changes upon the whims of others, yet it still retains its own history. Our history."

He moved on, while Danny stood in place, a little dumbfounded as to how corny this whole ordeal sounded.

"Wind is the element of freedom, for obvious reasons. It can never be restrained, and as easily as it can be a simple breeze, it can turn into a raging hurricane." Miaho looked at the floating white rune for a moment, before he moved yet again.

"Light is the element of dedication. It can be used for guidance, deceit, as well as some other things."

"Wait…deceit?"

"Look into the sun, and you're blinded," Miaho explained. "If someone believes that they're working towards a worthy cause, they look only into the light, and lose grip on reason and reality. Blind faith is one of the most dangerous weapons…" He sighed suddenly. "A weapon that Daron knows how to use well…"

Shaking his head quickly, he continued, this time a bright purple. "The psychic is the element of progression and evolution. It represents our own evolution as a species, as well as our possible future changes to adapt to our world…"

Danny looked over the circle once more. There were two spots open still.

"Thunder and lightning is the element of power. Through it, it shapes the world and the skies; but it's a different one in that it only shows itself during imbalances of power."

"Why's that?"

"Because that's what lightning IS, essentially: an imbalance of protons and electrons in the atmosphere. So, in a way, I guess, you could call it the 'peace keeping element.' It only appears with a breach of the balance, which is what Senka, Sara and I ensure."

He turned to the ghost child, a look of dead seriousness on his face. "And YOU, Danny, are the final element."

"W-wha--?"

"You represent the last element in the circle: Spirit. You have the pure power of your own soul at your disposal…a power that even Daron won't be able to stand up against."

"You…you really think that I'm that powerful?"

"I don't think, Danny, I know." Miaho smiled a reassuring smile, one without pride or arrogance or anything else that Danny had seen in his previous ones. It was one of compassion and comfort.

_Wow, that sounded a lot cornier out loud that I had hoped…_Miaho thought suddenly. He squelched the thought from his mind, before looking over to Danny.

"So, are you willing to let me help you help me?"

The ghost child looked down at the dragon's outstretched hand, before he transformed into his ghost self in a quick flash of light, and took it.

"Deal."

_Bzzzzzzt!_

Danny smiled at the sight of Miaho in front of him, victim of an electric touch attack that he had been subjected to many a time against Plasmius. His hair poofed out in all directions in a gigantic a-fro, a spark of green electricity jumping from hair to hair occasionally. Eyebrows low in his trademark glare, he glowered at his counterpart.

"You DO realize I'm going to have to get you for that, right?"

Phantom merely smiled. His first genuine smile in a long time.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

"Are we there yet?"

"I don't know."

….

"Are we there yet?"

"Probably not."

….

"Are we there YET?"

"Obviously _not_…"

…

"Are we there—?"

"NO!"

Dan whirled around on one of the little bunny demons behind him, forked tongue flailing as he hissed his anger. He shrunk at the imposing sight of the arch-ghost, and he nervously pointed to his twin. "H-he was the one that said it…"

He snarled, the bunnies squealing and running back a distance.

"And how am I supposed to be able to tell the difference between you two, then?"

Their expressions immediately turned indignant, much like a huffy woman, both sets of hands retreating to their hips. "If you would be so nice as to learn our _names_, then you'd know that we're Gleep and Meep."

"Gleep and Meep?" That sounded almost as dumb as Tweedledee and Tweedledumb… Well, except perhaps for Tweedledumb and Tweedle_dumber_…

"Yeah!" they both chorused.

"So how do you tell the difference between you two, then, anyways?"

The right one snorted, as if the reason was obvious. "Hello! Cause Meep doesn't SHAVE!"

The other bunny, Gleep, nodded, and parted the fishnet to reveal his "beauties."

Beauties that would have made Dan's stomach clench if he still had one.

"How many times to I have to ask why you keep them with us?" he growled. "They're absolutely USELESS."

"As many times as I will tell you that every plan needs its peons, Dan." Daron responded.

The quartet was fairly deep into the recesses of the ghost zone, far beyond anything that the youthful Danny Phantom had ever dared go.

Except, of course, for one very desperate battle.

The classing floating boulders hovered above them, menacing reminders of the power involved in the ancient fights between spectral giants of the ghost zone. Dan expunged the thoughts from his head, and continued onwards, following his new "leader."

"So, why exactly are we doing this again? Is he going to be another 'pawn' of yours?"

Much to the ghost's surprise, he merely shrugged. "He'll certainly be a good distraction, if nothing else. Besides, didn't you tell me that Danny only won against him because he had help?"

"Yes," Dan pondered aloud, "That was a particularly tough one..." His forefinger and thumb reached up to his chin, stroking his beardless jaw. "He has help this time, too, though. How is releasing him going to be any different?"

"Because, my dear boy, he has allies. Allies that we could use right about now."

They continued on over the landscape, and a lost castle loomed in the distance. Dan could remember his own memories of the place…they weren't pleasant ones, either.

Shoving his own useless fears aside, he floated on.

Undead buzzards soared in the skies, forever circling the scenery below them in endless unrest. Their cries were blood-chilling, and the twins had become uncharacteristically quiet.

Of course, their "are we there yet?" question was just rather dumb, now. Even the box ghost would have been able to tell where they were…not that he would have been stupid enough to come here. By himself, at any rate.

The quartet passed other ruins, huge ditches of dead bones scattered across the vast deserted rock, remnants of the previous battle that had taken place here. The fact that Daron walked past these indentations of destruction without even giving a sideways glance didn't do much to reassure Dan's insecurities at the moment either.

This were-chimera was insane…that much was assured by just the fact that he was coming here of all places…but could he really rid the world of his younger self and these new brats? That in itself was enough reason to stay with him…the destruction of his younger self wouldn't affect him now, being apart from time…Right?

His thoughts were interrupted as the castle finally loomed in front of them, a vast wall of darkness and obvious evilness…it was literally like something out of a videogame…

Complete with the comic relief via bunny demons…

Dan's smirk from his thoughts immediately vanished as Daron approached the ludicrously tall gates. He raised a hand, and muttered something. Turning easily, he walked in the other direction without so much as a glance towards the doorway.

"What..?"

"You might want to move." Daron muttered simply, and moved off to the side off of the steps, the bunnies following close on his heals.

Dan looked back at the doorway, and before he could ask why, it literally incinerated, shards of heavy molten metal flying everywhere. Instinctively he turned intangible, just in time to avoid a heavy fragment that carved a deep ridge into the ground behind him.

The quaking quickly stopped, and Daron appeared out of the mist, continuing on into the castle. He glanced at his left hand briefly, and to Dan's surprise smoke was still coming off of it.

"Hm…I still need practice with that one…"

He shrugged, and strode off into the castle. His ghostly counterpart followed, having no real idea of what to say.

The interior of the castle was rather bland, except for torn curtains, creepy pillars lining the walls, the giant gargoyles laughing in the top corners of the halls…

Basically, the place screamed "evil mad-man's hide out."

The long passageway met another in a t-shaped intersection, and Dan watched with a quirked eyebrow as Daron took an immediate right without so much as a look in the other direction. He was about to protest his actions, seeing as this place looked like it was a maze and they probably could get lost very easily. However, as soon as he rounded the corner, it was apparent why he didn't turn.

Before them was the great hall. And within it, the sarcophagus of Pariah Dark.

The were-chimera walked in without hesitation, his left hand glowing with a strange, and disturbing, yellow aura. Dan started forward, however Daron immediately held an arm out, with a harsh glance that warned him to stay back. His expression softened…albeit slightly…and he quietly said "Allow me to handle this."

He was going to try to face the ghost king…alone!

No, this wouldn't do…Daron, no matter how powerful he was, was no match for the ghost king on his own!

…was he?

Before Dan could create a plan of action, however, his counterpart was already in front of the sarcophagus and the yellow aura…apparently some kind of unlocking "spell" that the ghost vaguely recalled having been told about.

There was a pause, and then the door to Pariah's coffin opened.

Dust and mist poured out everywhere, much like the fog from dry ice and water, and flowed all over the floor like an unrolling carpet. And, with a heavy thud that was a hilarious contrast to the "mood" made by the fog, Pariah stepped out.

He seemed to be confused for a moment. But, then again, he probably was in awe that, of all things, a HUMAN had greeted him after his year-long slumber. His confusion quickly turned to a sadistic smile.

"Well…this is rather unexpected…who thought that a HUMAN, of all things, would free me?"

"It was an interest of mine…" Daron said quietly. It was strange…he looked so pathetically small next to the black-armored behemoth. He looked like no more than a child next to him, a tiny toddler trying to confront a full grown man about something. But the small man never wavered, and held his ground despite the incredibly imposing presence that the Ghost King provided so readily.

Pariah glanced over at the sword in a pumpkin close to his throne. So…his treacherous servant had been returned, had he? With a swift motion of his hand, the sword was drawn from the rotting pumpkin, and the Fright Night appeared before him.

"I'm…awake!" the ghost in purple armor exclaimed. "But then that means that…"

He turned towards his master, and a look of fear appeared in his eyes. "M-master! Please! I can explain!"

Silenced by a harsh glare, he bowed respectfully (and hurriedly, Dan observed,) before he retreated over to the corner, the mixed emotions of being glad of not being smoked on the spot and his fear of what lay ahead.

"Your treachery will be dealt with later, my 'loyal servant'…" Pariah muttered, before he turned back to Daron, who apparently hadn't moved from his spot.

"Now…I believe that our 'guest' must be taken care of," he chuckled half to himself. "I do owe something to you for releasing me from my prison…however I believe that now that your purpose is complete…" in the blink of an eye, his oversized spiked mace was in his hand, and in a whoosh of movement was smashing down onto Daron.

There was an ear-splitting crash as the mace collided with its target, the residing boom shaking the walls and shattering some of the windows.

Throughout this entire encounter, the bunnies were deathly quiet. Except for a brief moment when Meep scratched his butt, and smoothed out a ruffle in his fluffy tail.

A moment that Dan wished he had missed.

The dust began to settle, and it revealed the most astonishing sight that Dan had ever seen in all his years as human OR ghost…

Daron had survived, and not only that, he seemed to have the advantage, for he still stood quite upright, in fact one probably could have said that he was quite relaxed. His shoulders were slightly slouched, knees bent, and a foot tapped the now-cracked floor impatiently. One arm was rested easily at his side, drumming some tune in his head as he stood. His other arm, however, has held high above his own head, veins bulging out everywhere that his skin was visible.

That was when the realization had hit home: Daron had just blocked the attack with one hand. No magic, no tricks…just brute strength.

"So…" Daron said, a horrific red glow taking over his eyes that was even more unsettling than Dan's or Pariah's own sets of "evil eyes." "My purpose was _complete_ to you, was it?" He chuckled, and lowered the mace slightly so that it was almost touching his head. The ghost king strained, the obvious taunt feeding the flames of his temper. "You know, Pariah…you shouldn't play with pointy objects…it could put an eye out…"

A deathly scream echoed across the ghost zone, freezing the blood of all who heard it.

0o0o0o0o0o0

**Woot! Finally Finished! (Wipes brow) sure took long enough…**

**Quickie RPG (role playing game) outline for those of who you aren't gamers…**

**In reference to one episode where Danny was playing an online game with Tucker and Sam, that was an online one, and tend to have "groups" to accomplish things, such as going through dungeons and so on. The three main roles are healer, damage taker, and damage dealer, and Miaho was trying to explain to Danny his own abilities in terms that he would understand (grin). Miaho is technically a healer…he's just a far more developed individual power-wise, which is the main reason why he won against Danny in the fight this chapter, for those of you who keep emailing me and say that he's a Mary Sue…**

**Anyways… Hope you all enjoyed, R&R please!**

**Dak**


	8. Chapter 8

"No, no, NO!" Miaho yelled. "My center line! Control my center line!"

Danny cursed mentally, but did as he was bidden as his draconic friend practically danced around him, quite obviously outmatching him in his combat strength.

Or…to be more specific, was just more knowledgeable…

Phantom threw another punch, this time lower towards his opponent's abdomen, and was rewarded with a grunt of pain from his counterpart. The dragon smiled his compliment, before spinning off on to the side in a small whirl of water.

"You're getting better, but you're still a tad slow…you still need focus…" he said matter-of-factly.

The ghost rose in the air, readying another blast as a growl escaped his lips. "Oh? How? You've already taught me how to concentrate my energy and release it like a bomb!" And, as a punctuating factor, he released a flurry of blasts with a single sweep of his hand, releasing a spectacular display of flashing green explosions.

Many were a direct hit to his opponent, who screeched in pain as they charred his skin before blasting him back into a wall with an earthquake-like crash.

Danny's face was one that was half smirking because of the new powerful attacks he was capable of, and half one of horror at the possible tragedy that he had killed him. His fears were quickly quelled as a heavy rock heaved aside stubbornly by several thick strands of water, and a battered Miaho roused himself out of the rubble, blood coming out of deep cuts in his forehead and all over his body.

"Puny attacks like that won't defeat Daron, you idiot…" Miaho muttered darkly, the cuts on his face already starting to heal. He winced as he stood, cringing as a new wave of pain racked his body. "Daron's far tougher than I could ever be…"

"'You're the only one who can defeat him,' yeah, I KNOW, Drake…" Danny rattled off. "You've told me that so many times before, you never _show_ me how I'm supposed to do it!"

The half-dragon smirked, spitting out a small bit of blood to the side. "You're learning it on your own, whether you realize it or not…"

"Huh?"

The dragon stretched, taking no account of Danny's bamboozled expression now adorning his features. Testing his shoulder to make sure it wasn't dislocated, he held up his blood-caked, however healed, hand. "Much like you, I have a power that isn't very strong when it's just sitting there…" To demonstrate, Miaho made a small water ball in his hand, and threw it at a wall.

There, it splattered like a water balloon, leaving no discernable damage to the wall.

At the apparent lack of consideration, Danny raised a brow. "Okay…your point being…?"

Much to Danny's annoyance, he took no notice of his comment, and continued. "The next thing that I taught you was how to compress your energy into a small compact bomb, much like this…" Once again he demonstrated, another ball in his hand appearing, though this one shrinking slightly before he threw it. It collided with the wall, and this time a loud splash accompanied the hit. When the mist and water droplets cleared, there was a noticeable dent in the ancient wall.

"If you noticed from that explosion, most of the blast was lost into the air, not on the target. However…if you retain it, like so…"

He took a deep breath, and Danny reverted to his human form for a quick rest, eyes opened in interest. How many tricks did this scaly freak _have_?

Eyes closed in concentration, Miaho opened both hands above his head, half-cupped, and stood silently for a moment. His ghostly counterpart was about to say something about him making a show for nothing, until there was a small rushing noise.

…Running water, he suddenly realized.

In a sudden explosion of power, a miniature typhoon appeared over the dragon's head, swirling menacingly over his head like an angry elemental. With another deep breath of concentration, he slung his arms forward; with it, the gigantic spout of water following suit. As it flew, it changed shape into a human-sized sphere, hissing with the sheer speed of the white water, before colliding into the wall with a titanic crash.

It rubbed up against the wall for a moment, like a self-rolling boulder attempting to go up a hill. However the contest between the two large objects quickly became one-sided, and the sphere of water promptly (and almost indignantly) burrowed through the wall before exploding half-heartedly in the background behind the other ruins. The damage was done, however, and with a reluctant groan, the wall collapsed in a small shower of heavy boulders.

Danny could only blink at the damage, and stumbled, not realizing he had been off balance. The mist cleared, revealing a heavily panting Miaho leaning hard on one knee, tail out to steady himself.

"Heheh…you should see your face, Danny…" he half laughed, half coughed. "You look just like I did…when my master first showed me this…"

With a last sigh, he fell to the ground into unconsciousness.

Danny changed back into his ghost form, allowing the white light to travel from the tips of his fingers to his toes.

"Great…now I'm stuck with Godzilla in the ghost zone…"

That brought another thing to his attention…if Senka wasn't here… "Wait…how the heck am I supposed to get back?"

True, he was the "ghost kid" and had been around the ghost zone many times, though Senka had just teleported there, and now..

Now she was nowhere to be found…

Before a curse could come to his lips, however, his answer came with a whoosh of a portal, clock hands swirling about in a circle to reveal the aged face of an ancient ghost. He bore the aura of both time and wisdom, and his voice came with gentle strength that hinted at a power far more than what he chose to show.

"Clockwork?"

"Come, it's time you learned something…"

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

Dan was literally stunned with what was going on in front of him. Could this really have been happening…

Meep scratched again.

He shook his head. If it wasn't for those stupid bunnies being beside him, he would have sworn this was a dream…the sheer powers at work here…

He had to quickly turn intangible again to avoid another huge piece of debris falling from the ceiling, joining their many brothers strewn about the floor of the Ghost King's palace.

As he was on the defense, the two titanic forces clashed…and, to say the very least, their surroundings were hardly able to restrain their efforts at attacking one another. Walls cracked, windows shattered, and each confrontation left another dent in the floor.

Pariah scowled. How did a human have this much power…enough to challenge HIM? Magic was something that he himself had trained in during his lifetime, a trait that continued on into his afterlife…however that still didn't explain how this mortal was able to keep pace with him.

A body of flesh and blood should have hindered his powers…that was his whole reasoning for his willing pass-over in the first place…

Was there some trick that he had missed? Or was he just a ghost in disguise? That was a possibility…

He clapped his hands together, sending another wave at the trespasser to his home. If this… "Daron"…was truly a ghost, he was trying really hard to hide that fact. Never once did he go intangible to avoid an attack…although it was true that the more powerful a ghost became, the harder it was for them to go intangible for extended periods, he never had gone intangible in their entire fight. So if he WAS a ghost, he was either stupid, arrogant…

Or, more likely, both.

Daron was flying about the room like there was no tomorrow. Figuratively speaking, of course. The fact that he was not truly flying did not seem to slow him down at all in his relentless attacks. Fire, earth, lightning, and even blasts of pure light were thrown over at his target, which would have spelled ruin for any other being except for this one thing that had always eluded him…

The power of death…

A pure spirited body had no boundaries of flesh and muscle, magical or otherwise…this ghost king could be a god, if he had been properly trained, his spiritual power was enormous. A power that was, he decided, a possible addition to his already formidable artillery.

"Fordeus Lelucros!" he bellowed, letting out a wall of lightning from his outstretched fingertips. The attack slammed into his foe with a titanic crash, and sending him careening heavily into the wall. Pariah quickly recuperated out of the settling dust, however, and he let loose another beam of energy via crashing his mace into the ground.

The shockwave rattled the actual foundation of the castle, exploding upwards directly into Daron's face. Screaming in pain, he flipped like a tossed rag doll and fell with a sickening crunch into the floor.

Panting, Pariah stood up to his full height, towering over his downed antagonist. "To have the confidence to wake me up and challenge me with no second thought to your own safety…It's hard to say whether that is foolishness or bravery…perhaps a bit of both…"

The ghost king casually strode over to where Daron lay, unmoving. There he picked him up with a single hand, high above the floor so that his feet dangled pathetically.

Was this truly Daron's true extent of power? Pathetic…

"I wonder how death with be for you, little pest. Perhaps you wished it, so boldly rushing into battle with no inclination as to what sort of fight you were going to get…"

"No…" a sudden whisper came from the dangling corpse. "I didn't expect you to be so weak…"

"Why you little--!" Pulling his mace back, he lunged it forward, straight for Daron's heart. With a mighty slam, it collided, and a small spurt of blood dribbled on the ground.

"A magical mace…" Daron coughed. "I should have known…you're so reliant on objects…You need to go back to magical school…you know as well as I do that putting all of your energy into one thing…especially one that can be easily separated from you…is a trivial mistake. I took you for some great warrior…but you're just an amateur…"

With that, he inhaled a great breath, and focused it into a sharp stream that ignited into a raging fireball. Pariah flinched, his single eye charred with the magical flames. Daron took the opportunity, muttering another spell quickly, though accurately, under his breath.

With a single sadistic smile, he raised his hands up to the sky, an unholy purple aura snaking about his fingertips and a bright red amulet that rested in his conjoined hands…

The end…the _final_ end…was at hand.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

"You seem troubled, Danny."

"Of COURSE I'm troubled…" he grumbled, readjusting Miaho's weight across his shoulders. "It seems like every time I want to take a break, the world is in danger of some killer gerbil again or something…"

"That didn't happen in your timeline…" Clockwork muttered in confusion, mostly to himself.

Danny blinked. "What?"

The ancient ghost shuddered involuntarily. "You don't want to know…" He continued to float onwards, the ominous hallway on either side of them gliding past soundlessly. Of course, that was when Danny realized that it was their surroundings that were moving, and not them themselves.

"Neat trick."

"It's to keep the pests out," Clockwork explained. "If someone wants something from me, they usually try to take it by force. If you just try and fly down this hallway, it will never end, and you won't get to your destination. However if you ask, it will come right to you."

_BONG! THUD!_

Danny picked himself up from the ground, trying to clear his head of the stars that swam through his vision. "With some kicks in it for you, I suppose…"

The blue-skinned figure grinned childishly, opening the door that had appeared in front of them. "When you have an eternity to think to yourself, it's nice to have a change of pace to balance things out."

The ghost child grunted, before following the ancient ghost out through the door, unceremoniously dragging the dragon by the tail behind him.

"I don't think that Miaho will appreciate you dragging him along like that," Clockwork said after a moment in a semi-serious tone.

"He can regenerate…besides, it makes me feel better on the inside."

"Vengeance is not something you want to dabble yourself in constantly, Daniel. It only leads to emptiness…"

Opening his mouth to retort, Danny quickly closed his mouth and pushed the witty comment to the back of his mind. Arguing with a timeless being would only be a broken record of a conversation.

Especially if this ghost started using time loops as arguments…

"I've called you here because, unfortunetly, the situation that you're in has just gotten a lot worse…"

Danny groaned. "How?"

"Normally, in a situation such as this, I would simply freeze time, go in, and fix the problems as they arose."

"Because you the ghost of time…"

"Well…yes…but you see…"

"…you can't this time…"

"…Yes…and the reason for that is…"

"Your time amulets, the little 'get out of time free cards' that we found last time we were here…"

"Would you stop interrupting?"

"Sorry."

"As I was saying…" He paused, making sure that Danny was, indeed, not going to interrupt him this time. "Daron is now immune to my powers, which is pretty bad news…"

"So all we have to do is take back the amulet from him, and then you can zap him?"

"NO! QUIT INTERRUPTING ME!

"…"

Clockwork took a deep breath, calming himself. "Daron has found a rare item that, in his hands, is quite a nuisance."

"So what does—"

"UP!" the ancient ghost snapped. "Stop talking so I can tell you what you need to know."

Silence.

"What this amulet does, is it can acquire a basic trait of the target. So if he happened to use it on you, the amulet could absorb your intangibility, your ability to shoot blasts, something along those lines…"

"Acquire? As in steal?" Danny wondered aloud.

Clockwork's eyebrows fell at Danny's blatant disregard for his previous statements. "More like copy, but yes. That's part of the reason why he snuck in here, I suppose."

"Huh?"

"I'm not really sure how, but he must have found out about me, and so devised a plan to become immune to my powers using the Amulet of Reseia. And, once again I'm not sure how he found out, but he figured out that your future self, who was apart from time, was immune to my powers to an extent."

"So…?"

He sighed again. For a child who had saved the world countless times, he sure was dense… "So, he snuck in here and abducted Dan from me, and copied his resistance to time, and now I can't help you stop him.

"…Oh…"

Danny pondered a minute. "So if we stole this amulet from him, then you could still zap him?"

"Sadly, no. He's integrated that aspect of Dan into his being already. I can't affect him, or even watch him, for that matter..."

"Well…I guess it can't get any worst then, right?" the ghost kid laughed nervously.

"I just hope he doesn't absorb something truly powerful…If he did, it's very possible he'd become invincible…"

After an awkward, though brief silence, Clockwork shook his head to clear his thoughts, and a portal opened up before them. "That portal will take you home. Get some rest, I get the feeling you're going to need it."

**0o0o0o0o0o0o0**

**And now, since we haven't seen anything of Sam, Tucker, or Sarah in a while…**

**When Boredom Calls…The Sidekicks' Special**

"So…"

….

Tucker's eyebrows lowered, obviously a bit peeved that no had responded. "So…"

"We heard you the first time, Tucker," Sarah muttered.

He pouted, slumping back into the sofa, wincing when a drip of water hit him in the arm. "Any reason why we had to work here? I mean…couldn't we just do it over at Danny's house? It's a lot…cleaner…there."

"Oh yeah, Tucker, THAT would work," the older woman scoffed sarcastically. "Because his parents of COURSE wouldn't notice that Danny's friends and a complete stranger who's easily a decade older than him is working on something that they've probably never seen the likes of before in their lives…SO practical…"

Sarah snorted at the two kids sitting on the couch, before turning back to her little "project," the miscellaneous sounds of tool clinks and screws turning once again filling up the otherwise soundless apartment.

"You don't need to snap, Sarah," Sam said softly. "Tucker's just trying to liven things up a bit. It actually is kinda boring right now…"

"I KNOW…I know…" Sarah said, her voice softening. "Sorry. I'm just a bit annoyed at Senka and Miaho at the moment…"

"Why's that?" Tucker asked. "Did they ask you to make something?"

Her brow furrowed, her eyes in their normal annoyed look. "Standard question…" Tucker shrugged.

"Yes, they asked me to make something…but your stone age technology is hard to work with…it's like Tech 101 all over again…"

"Hey!" Tucker immediately piped up. "We have some GREAT technology here!"

"Same difference," she muttered. "It's still 2 _decades_ later than the usual stuff I'm used to working with…and difference with power sources…and other stuff…" she sighed. "This is gonna take a while."

"Well…what are you trying to make? Maybe I can help!"

Sarah looked over at the young teenager who was currently puffing out his chest, obviously trying to suppress a scoff. "Do you know anything about making synthetic magic?"

His eyes widened to the size of oranges, and Sam's quickly followed suit. "W-wha?"

"I'll take that as a no…" she half sighed to herself, then turned back to her work.

"'Synthetic magic'?" Sam asked half to herself. "Why are you trying to make something like that?"

"We need every advantage that we can get…especially since our team isn't even at full strength." She paused a moment, tapping her chin as she pondered over something. She resumed both her tinkering and her conversation simultaneously. "Daron's a being of magic. Only magical energies can hurt him. That's one reason why he's trying to get rid of _us_ right now…our team was the most powerful magical force on our world."

More clinks and scratches continued on into the silence, before Sam shifted her weight on the couch, creating a loud creak from the ancient springs. "So…how long has this 'team' of yours been going?"

The older oriental woman made no move to stop her tinkering as she continued on the conversation. "Hm…I'd say about seven years or so now…at least at first. Senka and Miaho came a little later."

"Later? I thought the portal opened up and all the powers came out at one time…how complicated **_are_** your back-stories, anyways?!"

Sam blinked at Tucker's outburst. "A part of me is amazed that you remember the details like that…and another is just plain creeped out…"

"Not everyone who was hit by the powers came to us right away, Tucker." She grunted in exertion with a stubborn bolt, and cursed lightly as it refused to move. "The blast might have been at one time, but people found us at different times."

"Us?" Sam inquired. "How many of you are there?"

"Um…a lot…" she paused for a moment, another small grunt coming out of her mouth. "Miaho and Senka, plus…let's see…nine…I think?"

"You 'think'?"

"Some people come and go, so there's no set number on it—OW!"

"You ok?"

"Ugh…you have any gloves?" She growled her question, cursing under her breath as one of her fingers sprouted a few drops of blood. "This metal's a bit sharp…"

"Not on me…" Sam said, slightly surprised at the random question. "Tucker's the gadget guy," she snickered.

"Do gloves sound like a cool high-tech gadget to _you_?" he muttered indignantly.

The gothic girl merely smiled, and slumped a little deeper into the couch, only to feel something slimy on the small of her back. Eyes wide, she leapt from the couch, a small yelp coming out of her lips.

"Grrrraaaatch!" something squeaked, before a dark green form jetted around the room and under the couch again.

"KOBBY! **_BAD_** KOBOLD! GET BACK IN YOUR CAGE!" Immediately stopping what she was doing, Sarah pulled out a long red…rod…thing…and began jabbing under the couch. There was a "BRAACCKKK" as she apparently hit something, and the black green form jetted out from the couch again, zipping randomly around the floor until it hit a pipe running up the wall with a loud clang.

There, lying on the floor, was quite possibly the weirdest creature that Sam or Tucker had ever had the misfortune of laying their eyes upon.

Eyes both wide X's as it lay on the floor, "Kobby" was like something out of a bad fantasy novel. Something like a cross between a poorly-groomed dog and a monitor lizard, it was an obviously humanoid being, as one of its "hands" were clutching what looked like a pair of boxers. A dog-like muzzle, reptilian haunches, and a short, thick tail that ended in a tuft of fur accommodated the little creature of destruction's features. Scaly patches of dark green scales glinted from below a calico mix of dirty brown (and currently hilariously static) fur, cute little ears twitching from the electricity that he had just been subjected to.

"Kobby…you KNOW that you're not supposed to be here…" Sarah fumed. "And you stole Miaho's boxers again!"

Tucker blinked. "'Again'?"

Sarah blanked, apparently having shared something that, for obvious reasons, should have stayed secret. "Eh-Heh…the reason why Miaho hates Kobby here…" she said, gesturing to the unconscious creature.

Sam and Tucker made a communal blink. Then a second.

The older woman picked up the little…thing…still suffering from small shocks that caused his patches of fur to stand out comically at random moments. "This, here, is a side-product of the portal that opened up…as you can see, magic isn't perfect…"

"Um…yeah…" Tucker said, unconsciously edging to the side on the couch.

"So…can he do anything?" Sam asked. "I mean, from what I can gather all of you on your…'team'…has super powers, right?"

"He can blow up."

"Huh?"

Sarah sighed, and pulled out a red-handled object from her pocket, and pointed it directly at Kobby.

A gun.

He screeched as she pulled the trigger, a small blast shaking the floor and the whole side of the building.

Both Tucker and Sam blanched, both quivering slightly. "Th-that's animal cruelty!" Tucker managed to blurt out. Sam just fell of the floor, barely registering what was going on.

"But…wha…?"

Sarah smirked slightly. It wasn't a sadistic one, however: more one of just mild amusement; before either of them could say any more, small black blobs gathered themselves in a pool, and a very distressed Kobby staggered on his feet, small swirled circling his head.

The older woman outright laughed now. "I'm sorry…I've gotten so used to having him blow up all the time I forgot it's horrific the first time that you see it…Sorry about that…"

Finding her voice, Sam finally spoke. "You mean…he'll be alright?"

"Hahaha, of course. In fact it gets rather amusing after a while…" She pulled the trigger again, and Kobby let out another shriek, accompanied by the admittedly amusing ground-shaking bang. The gun itself didn't fire anything…it was just a remote control to blow the poor little creature up.

Sarah smiled smugly, before picking up the newly-reformed, and currently unconscious, kobold by the tail. Quickly putting him into a small cage off in the corner, (where he promptly fell asleep,) she proceeded to continue tinkering on her little machine.

She sighed irritably, wiping her brow. "This is impossible…at least with the current equipment…"

Tucker scoffed again, folding his arms and pouting.

Sam sighed as well. "How important IS this machine, anyways? Why is this so important?"

Sarah flicked off a piece of metal that had been sitting on her fingers, and proceeded to grab an extra pair of pliers to view what she had already. "As I already said, Daron's a being of magic. Miaho, Senka, and Danny may all have magical attacks, and their combined strength could probably beat him…"

"But…?" Tucker interrupted.

"But," she continued, "that would only work while he's vulnerable. If they just shoot it straight at him, he'd probably find a way to deflect it or get around it. And a blast like that would drain all of their strength."

"So you're making a distraction!" Tucker thought aloud.

"Exactly. But in order for it to work, I need to find a different power source…a portable thing that generates electricity on a large scale…" she pondered a moment. "I think I know where we can buy one…but I'm going to need some money…lots and LOTS of money…"

"Like how much?" Sam asked, briefly wondering if they could somehow modify on of Danny's parents' gadgets into something.

"In the low millions, at least…I'd have to special order it from a company in Japan."

Off in the corner, Kobby let out a small hiccup in his sleep, but they took no notice.

Tucker stretched out his palms with fingers interlocked, letting out a nice set of cracking noises, as if he was about to undertake a huge new job, and Sam pulled out her cell phone, dialing Danny.

Both were smiling evilly, both thinking of the same person to go to, to ask for a "donation"…

This was going to be a fun day…

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

**I really apologize for this story being so late, however I recently through some incredibly annoyingly trying times, (which I'm not going to drone about right now, but to say the least it was a sucky last couple of months) so the updates for this story are going to be few and far between. **

**However, the story is in its final stretch, and as such the final battle is coming up soon as well, so stay tuned, and reviews (as always) are greatly appreciated!**

**Dakyu**


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